Dear GM: Goodwill Wants Its Logo Back. Maybe.
Observers of the brand world took note this week of the launch of General Motors’ new logo. Those observers quickly turned to critics, whether they occupied posts as auto enthusiasts (“watered down,” “weak,” mediocre”), tech denizens (“criiiiiinge”), or business journalists (“branding fail”). And there’s a lot to dislike. It draws on every cliché in the modern visual identity playbook without paying off on a single one of them – it’s set in a lower-case typeface, but still manages to look hopelessly out-of-date; its gradient is striking, but merely mimics Qualtrics’ color scheme; and the white space in the “m” is supposed to give us the image of a plug to signal the shape of an electrical plug – a feature that likely will need to be pointed out rather than celebrated for standing out (i.e., they didn’t pull off a FedEx).
And it looks like a slightly updated version of Goodwill’s 52 year-old logo. Full stop.
I know that brand history is rife with naming and design decisions derided at launch that turned out to be neutral or positive over the long run (see Xfinity, Netflix, Starbucks). People don’t like change. And I know I’m piling on. Sometimes the opinions of the masses even force reconsideration, as Gap famously learned in 2010 (side note – don’t update your logo when your brand is completely irrelevant). But there is a difference between a logo with low initial appeal and an identity that obfuscates and confuses.
GM claims that its new look – seemingly created exclusively by in-house designers (no agency, as of this writing, has been recognized in association with it) – is more "modern and vibrant" than the previous blue square. Hard to disagree with that. But what exactly is this modernity and vibrance supposed to convey? I applaud GM for thinking forward, but when a brand has as much heritage and lifespan as GM does, that legacy is an invaluable asset – it’s not something to shove aside. Microsoft, Burger King, and the Cleveland Browns nailed their pivots from one mark to the next while balancing modernity, relevance, heritage, and distinction.
And, let’s be honest, it isn’t as if GM is really doing much to move us to an electric future – far less than 10% of its fleet will be electric even 9 years from now. So it’s not like the logo is merely a poorly-conceived representation of a business model transformation. Instead, it seems as if a small group of creatives – with little to no grounding in business strategy – took to their Adobe Suites after receiving a bland brief discussed over a remote-work meeting to design a mark for one of the most celebrated, iconic companies in world history. I wonder what William Durant would have thought.
We’re left to wonder what was discarded and left on the cutting-room floor. It’s too bad that GM chose not to follow the practice pioneered by Google of bringing discarded alternatives into the digital public domain. Where is the version with a capital G and a lower-case m that metaphorically positions GM as an element, core to the foundation of GDP, job creation, automotive history, and transportation innovation? Where is the stylized “general motors” written out in a way that draws on the rich legacy of a trusted 113-year old brand that helped define the category and invites people to see it in a new light? Or just the paler blue cousin of the current mark that trades away some of the metallic, hard feel for a more vibrant, kinetic energy? Sure, it’s easy to play Monday-morning quarterback. But I’m not even a designer, and this is Brand 101/201 stuff, not Master Class stuff.
Maybe the reality is the saddest one – that no better options were ever created. That would be a shame, because there are dozens of agencies that would have yearned to be a part of this seminal rebrand. But heck, maybe it’s better that a company with ho-hum products have a ho-hum logo. Even if it’s less inspiring, it’s a lot more honest.