{"id":124,"date":"2011-12-14T21:41:23","date_gmt":"2011-12-14T21:41:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/2011\/12\/14\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/"},"modified":"2024-03-07T16:09:09","modified_gmt":"2024-03-07T16:09:09","slug":"dont-do-this-with-your-logo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/","title":{"rendered":"Analyzing Gap&#8217;s Logo Design Disaster"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the history of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.logomaker.com\">logo design<\/a> there are lots of notable successes.<\/p>\n<p>And a few logo disasters.<\/p>\n<p>And while most of the logos-gone-bad belong to small businesses, plenty of big businesses have spent millions on logo designs and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.freelogoservices.com\/blog\/2018\/11\/29\/how-to-successfully-rebrand-your-business\/\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"(Opens a new window)\" rel=\"noopener\">re-branding<\/a> programs that fail badly. One of the worst logo re-designs in history, by far, is\u00a0Gap&#8217;s.<a href=\"https:\/\/www.logomaker.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/gap_logo.top_1.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-7170 size-full aligncenter\" title=\"GAP Logo Change\" src=\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/Gap-Logo-Change.gif\" alt=\"Gap Logo Change\" width=\"475\" height=\"244\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<h2>Making sense of Gap&#8217;s rebranding blunder<\/h2>\n<p>After more than 20 years of consistent use, Gap announced a change to their well-known blue box logo. The new logo featured a small blue box in the top rich corner, almost like an asterisk to the name of the company. The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/media\/2010\/oct\/12\/gap-logo-redesign\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"(Opens a new window)\" rel=\"noopener\">reaction from customers<\/a> was incredibly negative. It spawned a fake Twitter account mocking the change, Facebook pages calling for a restoration of the old logo, a fake logo generator that helped you to create your own bad logo (called CrapLogo), and dozens of online protests panning the change. The <a href=\"https:\/\/money.cnn.com\/2010\/10\/08\/news\/companies\/gap_logo\/index.htm\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"(Opens a new window)\" rel=\"noopener\">media response<\/a> was just as bad. It didn&#8217;t take long for the Gap to reverse its decision (only 6 days, in fact) and opt to keep the old logo. Unfortunately, the clothing retailer had already sunk an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.canny-creative.com\/10-rebranding-failures-how-much-they-cost\/\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"(Opens a new window)\" rel=\"noopener\">estimated $100 million<\/a> into the redesign, only to have to backpedal to the old version as quickly as possible.<\/p>\n<p>So what lesson can a small business owner learn from this? Customers get attached to your logo. It represents their experience with your products and company. So once you&#8217;ve got a logo that works for you, stick with it. As one television sales person used to say, &#8220;Set it, and forget it!&#8221;\u00a0Use your logo consistently. And if you absolutely need to update or change your logo in the future, incremental changes work best.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the history of logo design there are lots of notable successes. And a few logo disasters. And while most of the logos-gone-bad belong to small businesses, plenty of big businesses have spent millions on logo designs and re-branding programs that fail badly. One of the worst logo re-designs in history, by far, is\u00a0Gap&#8217;s. Making [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":117,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,37,33,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-advice","category-branding","category-logomaker","category-logos"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Analyzing Gap&#039;s Logo Design Disaster | Logo Maker<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Gap&#039;s $100 million logo design disaster was one of the worst re-branding efforts ever made. Here are a few lessons we can learn from their branding mistake.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Analyzing Gap&#039;s Logo Design Disaster | Logo Maker\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Gap&#039;s $100 million logo design disaster was one of the worst re-branding efforts ever made. Here are a few lessons we can learn from their branding mistake.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"LogoMaker\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-12-14T21:41:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-03-07T16:09:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/Gap-Logo-Change.gif\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"475\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"244\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/gif\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Amber Ooley\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Amber Ooley\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Amber Ooley\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/5f0e84c2ffd89ceeefa1233736e28140\"},\"headline\":\"Analyzing Gap&#8217;s Logo Design Disaster\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-12-14T21:41:23+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-03-07T16:09:09+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/\"},\"wordCount\":289,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/Gap-Logo-Change.gif\",\"articleSection\":[\"Advice\",\"Branding\",\"LogoMaker\",\"Logos\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/\",\"name\":\"Analyzing Gap's Logo Design Disaster | Logo Maker\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/blog\/dont-do-this-with-your-logo\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/startwp.logomaker.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/Gap-Logo-Change.gif\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-12-14T21:41:23+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-03-07T16:09:09+00:00\",\"description\":\"Gap's $100 million logo design disaster was one of the worst re-branding efforts ever made. 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