Fresh Meat

Recently, we presented a logo in a public forum. If you haven’t had that experience, I recommend a root canal instead. Make that ten root canals…without anesthesia. You’ll surely feel better than I did, which was pretty close to how the Christians must have felt being torn apart by lions. For those who have escaped this sadomasochistic ritual, here’s how it works: you spend six months working relentlessly – discovery, exploration, intercept interviews, brand promise, frames of reference, pencil sketches, round upon rounds of design – vetting, refining, perfecting. Am I complaining ? No. that’s what we do for a living. In fact, that’s what we like to do for a living. But it is in the public arena where things turn dark and sinister, for here you present your logo recommendations to a room full of people bearing every grievance known to man, very little of which has anything to do with you. Alas, this is your fate when you have a public contract. There is nothing to do but sit back and hope it’s over soon. You haplessly dodge a barrage of insults. Your character is assassinated, your skills scorned, your taste reviled, your profession maligned. You may even be told that your mother wears army boots. The lions are upon you. They rip your limbs off, and feast on the raw and bloodied flesh. But the crowd lusts for more, so the coup de grâce is delivered…you are told in front of all the world, that not only are you absent character and talent, you’ve been doing it wrong all these many years. Yup. That’s right. You are stunned to learn, in this public forum, that “a logo doesn’t take any more than five minutes”. Further: “Anyone who tells you they spent more than five minutes on a logo is ripping you off! I get logos ALL THE TIME.” (For a moment you raise your limp and battered head and think, “who gets logos all the time?”. Apparently this fellow does, for with the authority and righteousness that can only be summoned by the moronic, he roars, “I just call my daughter, she designs one and 5 minutes later, I have a logo. Five minutes! That’s all it takes.” Yet even in my annihilated state, I have two sources of comfort: 1) Last week this same guy was probably railing about potholes (wonder what the time limit is for filling a pothole…3 minutes? 6 minutes?); and 2) I know that a single visit to his website will vindicate me. So to all my esteemed colleagues out there for whom logo design has been a process of investigation, inspiration, idea, execution, application, and maybe even a little love, the LOGO TOOK TOO DAMN LONG! Postscript: the logo was approved and will make its first public appearance soon.