Do famous companies prefer Logo Design Contests – Yes or No? « Graphic Design Blog - An Ultimate Resource for Graphic Designers

Do famous companies prefer Logo Design Contests – Yes or No?

18 Comments

Posted on Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

While there are numerous irrational squabbles going over the subject of “online logo design contests”, one can’t deny the rapidly changing logo design trends. A handful of designers, adverse to the concept of design contests, are lamenting over the emergence of this unique trend. This is because many famous corporations are opting for these online contests to get their identity designed.

But for those who might not know, acquiring a corporate logo through a design contest is not a new practice. This exercise has been adopted in the past by many famous corporations and continues being a popular option nowadays as well. Let us take a brief account of some genuine cases.

Toyota logo:

Toyota, the automobile giant, held a logo design contest in 1936. There were 27,000 aspiring entries and the winning logo was the three Japanese katakana letters for “Toyoda” in a circle, which was later modified by Risaburō Toyoda to "Toyota" because it took eight brush strokes to write in Japanese (a symbol of fortune).

Olympic Airlines Logo Redesign:

Last year, the logo redesign of Olympic Airlines came as a result of an online logo design contest as well. Panos Triantafyllopoulos was the winning logo designer with 11,652 votes and received euro;20,000.

EU Organic Logo Redesign:

A very recent logo redesign we witnessed this year was the EU organic logo. The EU launched an online design contest to rebrand their logo for organic products this year. Selected from 3,500 submissions by EU arts and design students, Dusan Milenkovic’s entry was adjudged the best. He won with 63% votes out of 130,000 online voters and a cash prize of euro 6,000

Google Favicon:

Google launched an online design contest for its favicon in 2008. André Resende, an undergraduate student from Brazil, won the contest for making a white lowercase ‘g’ on a Google color background. And who can forget the “Doodle4Google” contest for students.

Spud Webb – The basketball Legend:

It is evident that famous entities are increasingly opting for online design contests to get their corporate identity made. This trend has been lately seen in the sports industry as well. Presently, Anthony Jerome Webb better known as Spud Webb has started an online logo design contest on Mycroburst.com in search of an attractive basketball logo for his official website. This is a big slam dunk opportunity for logo designers who have the opportunity to win USD $300.

If logo design contests are allegedly bad, then why famous corporations have been opting for them? After witnessing such legendary cases of corporate identities, do you still believe that logo design contests warrant the cynicism they get? Don’t you think ”logo design contests” have been playing an important role in providing memorable logo designs to the industry?

18 Appreciated Responses

my blog On April 22nd, 2010 at 4:13 am

1

Yes,I think they prefer to do that

Elisa On April 22nd, 2010 at 1:11 pm

2

The logo design contests aren’t bad for smaller companies, but by bigger companies using this I think it’s diluting work for good designers. Bigger companies have to go through so many loopholes before they get something out to the public anyway, so why not just hire a good design firm. Big companies like Toyota using a contest don’t compare, they held that contest in the 30s, if that contest were held now, hundreds of thousands of entries would have to be considered.

Shovel On April 22nd, 2010 at 2:54 pm

3

Wow, never thought that such companies do constest to design their logos. Always tought that for example google have their own super design gurus..

I think in a way like this, they can get their logo designed more cheaply or even for free, because there are a lot of people who are willing to design something for goole + more variation to choose from.

Vitaliy On April 22nd, 2010 at 7:39 pm

4

Of course yes! This additional advertising and brand promotion

Derrick Workman On April 22nd, 2010 at 11:26 pm

5

Wow very interesting I had no idea about toyota and the google fav icon.

acekard ds On April 26th, 2010 at 4:44 am

6

Oh thanks for sharing the great famous logos here. I am also designing my own company’s logo. I will take help all of these logos in it.Thanks for sharing such a famous logo stuff here…

Justin On April 26th, 2010 at 8:28 am

7

I don’t like design contests, because its basically a way to get alot of design without paying for it. Would you go to 5 restaurants order 5 meals and only pay for the one you liked? Or would you ask 5 pritners to pritn your job and only pay for the one you like?
That doesnt work in otehrs businesses but it seems in design busienss want design for free all the time.

Nessa On April 29th, 2010 at 2:34 am

8

well, there are good and bad sides to logo contests but i would say that it gives rise to health competition and once in the professional market, its all about healthy competition and the best team winning

Professional Web Design On May 4th, 2010 at 2:08 am

9

Yes bro

Todd On May 4th, 2010 at 8:47 am

10

Crowd-sourcing is the devil!

Powersolo On May 5th, 2010 at 8:12 am

11

It depends on the judging…

Jesseca | Print Brochures On May 11th, 2010 at 1:34 am

12

For big companies, I think logo contests is not a good idea. Branding is a crucial aspect in every companies and big companies need to take care of what they’ve established over a long period of time. For big companies, it’s wise to let the marketing experts handle the branding side which includes the company logo.

logo design contest On May 20th, 2010 at 1:16 am

13

yes logo design contests are always preferred since they believe in the dictum “multiple brains are always better than one”. and crowdsourcing has its beauty in the fact that you never know where and in which part of the globe hidden talents are lying. Great insightful post!

Steven Tinnon On May 28th, 2010 at 2:04 pm

14

I just like the spud web logo, I miss that little guy

Steven,

Design contest for new logo designers On September 13th, 2010 at 6:18 am

15

I think online logo design contest websites are a very good way for young designers to build up their portfolios. I wish these kind of websites were around when I first started.

Isabel Diaz On September 17th, 2010 at 5:18 am

16

I have not tried any logo contest or crowd sourcing before. But reading this article and seeing the comments made by other people, I don’t think I would give it a try anytime soon. I would highly recommend trying out logo design companies online that design logos professionally though.

Graig Karl On October 20th, 2010 at 9:21 pm

17

Logo design contests are no different from pirate sites. Why pay someone $100,000USD when u can get it for free. It takes away from the ethics of the industry. For aspiring musicians there’s local contests where they can horn their talents but for an established musician there’s the big record companies to join. Large corporations should be accountable enough to seek the defined wisdom of a professional design firm. It kills morale and hurts the industry to have someone accept a fraction of what it ought to cost to make a beautiful logo simply because a corporation is looking to save money. In that case, let me walk into my local grocery store, pick up a pear and taste each one till i find the juiciest one. Where’s the sense in that?

Stephanie On February 15th, 2011 at 3:53 pm

18

very interesting. i had no idea that companies like google used logo contests.
do you suggest any website that deals with logo contests?