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Identifying trends for logo design

Heising, Charis (2014) Identifying trends for logo design.

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Abstract:Aim In the Netherlands, people visit supermarkets on an average basis of 140 times a year. Every visit, consumers get to choose from thousands of products. Within every category, there are several brands that can be chosen from. The brand strategy of a brand can influence the product that a consumer picks. Brands play a critical role in establishing a firm’s visibility and position in (international) markets. The Corporate Visual Identity (CVI) is an important part of the brand strategy. The CVI provides recognizability for example. Within corporate visual identity research, the logo has been highlighted as a key element, which can represent the organization to internal and external stakeholders. Although the logo is of great importance, the scientific research that has been done regarding this topic is limited. Especially when it comes to trends in logo design. There are multiple websites that predict design trends, but they lack scientific proof. Besides, supermarket brands are not commonly studied, although consumers make choices about these products on an almost daily basis. Method: In this study, a content analysis was used to analyze the trends amongst supermarket brands for the past 65 years. Here fore, the Dutch brand top 100, conducted by the Symphoni Iri group was used. The older variances of the logos were found with help of the regarding company or by research on the Internet. A codebook was made, based on literature about logo design. The codebook was extended and improved with input from experts, some other respondents and by a pre test. The final version of the codebook was used to analyze 213 logos. Findings: The main results that were revealed by this study, were the following. Most (supermarket brand) logos have red as a main color. Complementary, the most found color scheme had red and white in it (those colors were both found most as main color, as well as supporting color). Another popular color in logo design is blue. Over the years, the colorfulness of logos increased. Also, a sans serif font is added more often. This adds a more modern look to a logo design. And (probably because of the crisis), more brands choose to get rid of the use of capitals in their logo design Over the years, depth effects are more often added to designs, they also look more advanced than they used to. New technology and printing techniques have probably influenced this development. In contrast to 3D effects, also flat design seems to be a trend. Back to very simple -and as the word says- flat designs Geometric logos do not occur very often, but logos even start to become rounder over the years. The use of opacity and lens flare increased over the years. Also, brands more often tend towards an organic, more natural look And brands try to show their authority by adding additional information like a year of registration or a location statement to their logos. Practical recommendations: The results of this research might be very interesting for designers. Logos are one of the main vehicles for communicating the image, cutting through the clutter and speeding recognition of the product or company. Therefore, it is of great importance to make a proper selection for a certain logo. Every design option that the designer choses, can have influence on the impact that a logo can deliver. A very important choice is to choose the right color (combination). Many brands use red in their design, because that color is active and vibrant and it signifies a pioneering spirit and promotes ambition. However, other colors could deliver competitive advantage, because they could contribute towards an outstanding look. Blue, green and white are calming and pleasant colors. These colors could also be used when a brand would like to have a more natural appearance. This is especially interesting for brands that deliver products that are closely linked to nature. To create a natural (organic) look, it helps to add roundness, lens flare and multiple colors to the design. If a brand wants to deliver a trendy look, it is wisely to choose carefully between either a 3D look, or the opposite: a flat design. No matter what kind of design you chose, it is always good to add round curves to a logo design. Future research : Future research. Limitations: As it comes to scientific research, it is always difficult to achieve complete reliability. Within this study only one researcher did the whole analysis. Therefore, the results are not completely objective. Another insecurity is the completeness of the corpus. Only few of the companies whose logos were studied, were able to send their previous logo designs by email. Some of the companies did not have their previous designs digitalized very well; others refused to cooperate, because they got a lot of that kind of requests. So, a lot of logos had to be found on the Internet. Since different sources were used to hunt down these logos, it is not sure whether the list of logos is complete, or not.
Item Type:Essay (Master)
Faculty:BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences
Subject:05 communication studies
Programme:Communication Studies MSc (60713)
Link to this item:https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/65454
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