Last week, One World Direct launched a newly updated web site with a new logo. Please check it out at www.owd.com.
I thought I’d share with you the reasoning behind changing our logo and updating our site.
Like all of our clients, One World is focused on building our company and our brand. A logo, while not a brand by itself, is a big part of a brand’s identity. With our previous logo – we settled. We allowed ourselves to be rushed by our graphic designers, but we never loved it. I’d look at it and wince a little bit, knowing that it wasn’t right.
The great logos: Coke, IBM, Apple, Shell Oil and others have had updates over the years, but they’ve all maintained their basic look and feel. That’s what we wanted – a logo with good bones that would stand the test of time.
In our previous logo, the word “Direct” was small and diminished, which is wrong – we’re all about Direct commerce. The art deco typeface was too precious and inconsistent with typefaces used on the site and in our daily business. The colors weren’t consistent with our look/feel, either. Overall, it just didn’t fit.
This time around, I chose my graphic designer very slowly. After talking to a lot of people, I finally met a designer who had a different take on producing our logo. He’s Matt, a self-described “brand guy” who goes far beyond graphic design. Matt dug into our brand deck and worked to understand our company’s brand attributes, which then informed his design. Hours were spent on font choices and colors and icon design. The logo itself took months. While Matt had strong ideas, he never pushed for the sake of being finished. He was always listening, trying to understand the company’s attributes and how they informed his design work.
We went down every path with our logo – dozens of designs were considered until we finally came to rest on a basic type treatment. The typeface was chosen because it’s strong and simple. The “O” is a perfect circle – a globe – an acknowledgement of our previous logos and the global aspirations of our company. The tangerine pointer inside the “O Globe” was the final element. The pointer has multiple meanings. For starters, it’s a pointer! It means: we have a direction; it’s pointed up for a reason – we all want to grow. Being inside the globe is a reminder of the nature of the Web – it’s world wide. The pointer inside the “O Globe” then led to a complete family of icons.
In all, it was a really long and sometimes arduous process, but I’m glad we went through it. As for Matt the Brand Guy, I liked him so much I hired him as our first Creative Director. He’ll be joining us full-time later this summer and leading our Agency division. More on that in the months to come.
Thomas E. Unterseher
Co-Founder & CEO
One World Direct
www.owd.com
