Ingers

6 hours ago, grantholtgolazo said:

I don’t think anyone is saying off field matters are unimportant, maybe just that dwelling on the (subjective) negatives of a badge, when there’s so many more positives around the club than any time in recent memory, seems odd

Is it therefore more disappointing that when football matters are the best for over a generation, the branding is (subjectively - as is the point of a forum!) so far below what this great club should demand going into its 150th year as founders of the whole league and back into the top tier of European Football?

This thread is for debate over the brand and crest - should we not want every aspect of our club to be the best it can be?  Should there not be posts elsewhere about the North Stand, GA+ pushing out 'regular' fans, the ticket selling issues etc?

Lets aim for excellence everywhere - Unai gets it, do Ben,Chris and Doris the designer?

11 hours ago, 0Lamptey said:

On the face of it, the video is nice, and the roll out is starting to introduce some consistency. Sorting out the colours and the fonts out is a big step forward. 

But it still all looks reverse engineered to me.

There's a nice bit in the video where they pick out some of the ironwork in the gates and link it to the font, but then they've just picked an off the shelf font with some flourishes that are tenuous at best.

I really like the 'A' pulled of the gates. Maybe they could have used that for the AV150 logo if it was so influential to the branding.

They make a thing of the 1874 on the mosaic, but when translated to the badge it's just in very basic Helvetica(?) font with no character to it. 

The double outline and shield shape comes from an old V-neck shirt does it?

There's nothing new or unique here. The website is looking better, but to me it's very generic and does nothing to make us stand out.

 

100% reverse engineered for me - saw the backlash/lukewarm reception to the badge in January, delayed launch and came up with some bobbins to justify it all......agreed re the continuity - if its a part of the brand - use it throughout, I noticed the font for the 1874 too  - too many conflicting parts muddled together.  

New ornate "curly" font seems out of place and too different to the crest font and basic  text font on the website for my eyes  - its early days, but too much for me - could have gone with the crest font or a derivative to keep it 'onbrand'.....

Maybe they will update the crest page (under history) on the website soon too..... with the latest  'winning design' and some more questionable copy....

originals with just the ornate lion - fly off the shelves, not with the whole heck badge.

Still don't like the badge, but the 'two line' theme is interesting and would be great......if we hadn't just signed up to have a "three line" world famous logo all over our kits!

2 minutes ago, thunderball said:

I agree with a lot of what you said here. However the round badge was externally commissioned and thats is perhaps more unsatisfactory, I guess you cant please all the people all of the time.

A lot of people have a downer on Heck, it seems to be a sport and common narrative for Villa fans. He is very American and an easy target and to label as not understanding our sport. But he has a big task ahead, he's gong to upset a few along the way as is the way and the nature of the task. Could be convenient soundbites and easier said than done but I have to say I do like his tone and analysis: 

“The club was run on efficiency as opposed to ambition,” he says, and being tight-fisted wasn’t helping the brand grow.

“I didn’t come over here to be average,” Heck adds, describing the huge potential he sees for the club in its 150th anniversary year. 

“This is the club that’s going to break the mould,” he says. The top level of the Premier League is in flux. The traditional ‘big six’ is changing and Aston Villa ended the current season ahead of the likes of Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United. It was this potential that appealed to Heck. 

“Aston Villa was the one that stood out. It’s in a huge market, it’s a club of history and then they hired this magical coach,” he adds. “This is the club that’s going to break the mould and that’s when I was like – OK, I’m in.”

We have to give the guy some trust and time to evidence his actions. I think it will take a while but he is trying with the implementation of several initiatives already for good or bad, and I would suggest he is a net gain. Time will tell but I wish him well, we have a long way to catch up and quickly too. There is phrase in tech 'move fast and break things', some of that may be the attitude here as we have been laggards for decades.

 

I'm fine with his improvements to our financials, commercial deals etc, plus his ambitions and aspirations - but he doesn't seem to understand our sport, or club, or he is too brash and confident to take a pause, and some advice, on how to communicate to us.  It appears from the delay and soft 'under the radar' launch of this badge that the club knows its not well liked - and having the arrogance to design it "in house" is embarrassing and shows in the lack of coherence through the 'brand board'. The quotes above are all well and good - but the lies and misdirection from the puff piece and the 'its with the fans' comments are insulting.

@PaulMcGrath_5  I'll pay that -  I was as I started to write...!

I'm lost for words....

There are so many issues with this badge - the yellow lion on light blue, the blobby lion (which is being used by other companies and even clubs!) as opposed to the much better current round badge lion, the unbalanced nature of the design, the small font, text at the bottom, the star, and the fact that when used anywhere but on the shirt there is hardly any claret - not to mention the shadow.

I've warmed to idea of the shield shape and can see the benefits of having a unique shield shape (I don't like this one, but at least it is unique) - the double outline looks odd on actual badge, but I see the use of just a double outline of this shield shape - with adidas release and in the marketing link.

Having listened to others on here, I can also see the reason for brand evolution as opposed to revolution perspective.

I like the idea of the whole brand being updated, however....

The brand update 'brand book' on the puff piece is woeful - I count at least 4 unrelated and vastly different fonts, images of round and shield badges,  - not what I would call #onbrand, and nothing remotely related to the 150 mark  - then there are all the visuals from behind the player, at the awards - not included.

The statement about the design being 'in house' is the kicker, and explains why this whole process is incoherent and has produced such an amateur result - which is supposed to accompany us to the next level and sell our brand globally. You couldn't make this stuff up.

Finally, and perhaps the most disappointing from Mr Heck, are the outright lies in the marketing week piece (and on his videos) - repeatedly treating the fans -  'his customers' like idiots.

Its so good on the pitch, just such a shame our grand old club just can't get it right off the pitch....

20 minutes ago, thabucks said:

 

 

I mean the lion has been yellow since the 90’s just sayin … 

we've been sh*te since the 90's....

Team is changing, lion should too.....

56 minutes ago, MrBlack said:

Sounds like you will anyway, but please ask them to explain the thought process behind why yellow on light blue was brought back. That colour match up was a huge reason why we moved away from the Lerner era badge in the first place.

It's not been a villa colour combination for most of our history or any of our successful periods.

Yellow on light blue is such a jarring colour scheme that isn't visible from any distance. What we do with that colour scheme won't scale well (drop shadow or not).

I'd like to reiterate this point re yellow on light blue and ask why we seem to be reusing the old flat lion form the lerner badge when we have a much more vibrant, aggressive looking ( and more scalable) new lion from  the Dragon Rouge current round crest.  The old lerner lion is being used by other clubs on their website and companies selling other products - surely it it trademarked as an Aston Villa Lion - and if not, then why reuse it?  How does this new trademarked blue and yellow badge represent Aston Villa on the global stage - our colours are claret and blue  - the badge should be predominately claret and blue, with gold accents only.  How do they think this new badge scales on social media, in the media etc and across the world to represent the original (150 year old) claret n blue team? 

Thank you for all your work in this area and best of luck getting any straight answers - to echo the other post, the current lack of communication and misdirection is insulting to the fan base.

15 minutes ago, Jas10 said:

I can see the logic of not using too much claret in a badge that’s going to be on a predominantly claret shirt… but a good design and sensible colour scheme would be nice or the least we should expect/deserve…

Maybe a standalone lion is the (only) solution… on the shirts and certain training wear, tops etc.

  

On the shirt - yes, but our badge is our "brand" everywhere - on media, TV, Websites, predominantly on white backgrounds, and often vastly reduced - needs to be claret and blue (or blue and claret) with minor gold detailing to pop - look at the twitter video just posted of the stumps paintings, and if you didn't know, tell me what our colours (and brand) are...

@CarryOnVilla I was joking re the yellow lion....  As per the previous 200 odd pages, never yellow or gold on blue, claret on blue, or maybe gold on claret (with enough blue elsewhere), or blue on claret...

7 minutes ago, Jas10 said:

Exciting to have adidas on board and I’m looking forward to seeing all the gear and merchandise they will produce… but an ugly badge is going to reduce the appeal and maybe even spoil certain products… I hope the badge can live up to and match the quality of the gear…

100%  - Adidas make some nice stuff, especially some of the retro stuff, but its such a shame its gonna have the blobby drop shadow badge on it  - just the lion, then maybe, new heck badge and I'm keeping my dollars....

@Mazrim sorry - I only learnt illustrator to play with these badges - been copying and manipulating the many iterations - and I don't have the time (or the will left with the impending reveal from Mr Heck) to make them exact - it was just a quick iteration to improve on what I think is coming...

2 minutes ago, Jas10 said:

Tbh… like many others… I’m just tired and fed up of all this crap and how long it’s taken… just get it done and let’s move on…

But yeah… we should have gotten something much better and have had a choice… poor communication and a “show” or “ticking (bare minimum) boxes” rather than actually consulting the fans and getting proper input.

I’ve also said before… there are many professionals and designers within our fanbase that could have consulted and even designed something brilliant but weren’t even contacted or considered. Those at the club are just going to do what they want…

As long as it’s not terrible… it’s just time to move on. 

if its the drop shadow or even the detailed lion one from the leaks, which lets be fair its 99.9% going to be - its terrible....

2 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

Yeah, it sucks, it's a massive shame we didn't take the opportunity to do something better, or just leave what we have alone, but in a few weeks it'll hardly matter.

The Lerner badge was shit, I couldn't believe what we ended up with, but it's hardly like we were seething about it week in, week out, it won't matter any more once that is just the badge, we'll stop thinking about it until some other bigshot decides it's time to have another go.

The aesthetics really grind my gears - don't like the learner iterations, or the new trademarked one at all, don't mind the purslow round badge (as similar to my origin badge in early 80's) but lion needs to flip left and I see the issue with a round badge as a brand.

It even annoys me when we have terrible kits, especially random away and hideous 3rd kits (like the current blue one) despite the great football on show at the moment, it just gets to me.....

@CarryOnVilla

yellow or claret?.....

Just now, mottaloo said:

Winning the biggest tournament in european club football is definitely not small time.

No I agree 100% - Greatest achievement of our magnificent club.

However, having it on the badge is small time compared to the clubs we currently want to compete against  - Liverpool (where are their 6 stars?) Man Utd (maybe in a year or so!) Man City, Chelsea etc....The BIG clubs, who expect to be in the UCL don't make small time gestures....

Surely the aim to to be at that table, and eventually win it again - then another redesign?

Just now, Jas10 said:

The fact that they’ve gone with yellow for the adidas logo within the shield… suggests that we’re sticking with the old colour scheme and sickening yellow…

Claret adidas stripes would’ve looked better and more distinct… as would a claret lion on that and background n shield… but it’s not happening.

I think the only hope is a detailed lion with some contest but I am more and more fearing that it is the same old flat yellow lion… with that amateurish drip shadow…

Think we all have to accept that the horrid yellow on blue colour scheme is here to stay… maybe forever

Unfortunately I agree with you for the badge, terrible blobby lion that is being used by other companies and clubs!

I can only hope that its just a  detailed lion by itself on the 150 year shirt.....

I have trouble letting this go....., thicker borders but #NO YELLOW (and no small time star)

by far from my favourite, but you have to work within the #ONBRAND brief eh?

1 hour ago, Stevo985 said:

The sad thing is this reveal actually looks really **** cool, imo. 
 

Im finding myself quite excited. 
 

But it’s all going to (probably) be for a very disappointing badge. If it was actually a really Good badge this would all be brilliant

Agreed, the reveal looks to be everything the badge is not!  would love to know the process (or lack of) behind the badge.  

If the FA says consultation - it should be a multi phase, open ended consultation process - not a closed question, already decided, questionnaire only sent to a tiny fraction of the fan base.  (I was included in Purslow's questionnaire, but excluded from the final vote - fair enough due to level of membership, but wasn't even included in Heck's "loaded"  questionnaire  - and when I emailed to ask why, was ignored.)

The 'new' results conflict with the much larger results and overwhelming consensus from last year - why not blend the results, do a next round of consultation - 256 pages on here suggests the fan base does not feel adequately 'consulted'.

Take this information to the design agencies and get them to pitch their range of ideas - (anyone know who the design agency is for this latest design?!)

Following a more transparent process and after also engaging the FCG, rather than just presenting to them, then perhaps put forward 3 or 4 options to the membership/season ticket holders/people with significant ticket history for final feedback - then the fans feel consulted, and it protects against rogue feedback. As a design agency might pitch 3 or 4 ideas to a company for a new logo.

Heck stated that the badge was 'with the fans...' I presume for feedback - can anyone on here tell me they were consulted after this?

Within this process the fanbase, feels consulted, and even if the club (and agency) have a preordained option, the club knows how popular it will be, and can gauge the overall feeling before spending significant amounts on rebranding across the entire operation - and maybe encountering (more) embarrassing feedback in the media.

I understand that design by committee is the failing of many badges/logos etc - but the current process and outcome is laughable - its unbalanced, weak, the wrong colours and scales very poorly, with a blobby lion that is being used by other companies and even clubs in their media - surely it should be copyrighted.

What price the negative reaction, feedback, media coverage, and lack of brand awareness, with potential for another redesign in the next few years?   

".....I can’t see how that will look decent........not sure that was thought out properly."

...not the first time those comments have been used about this 'rebrand' eh?

Dear Mr Heck, 

I don't like your double claret and white border (against a claret shirt?!?)  or the shape of your shield, but it seems YOU have decided, without consulting us............

........but, its not too late to salvage something from this mess.......x

14 hours ago, Stevo985 said:

I can assure you that I’m moaning because the badge is **** crap. It’s nothing to do with mob mentality 

 

I actually think people are so bored with the badge stuff that this “new” one will get a much milder reception. People are sick of it so they’ll just accept it. 
 

If we’d heard nothing and they suddenly unveiled this as the new badge there would be uproar. 
 

It’s absolutely shit

I agree 100% 

The new badge is very poor, for the variety of reasons mentioned here over 256 pages and elsewhere. 

However it seems that they are squeezing it through the 'process' with minimal changes to design and colour, to bypass true consultation - I can see why they would take this approach, but it seems so shortsighted and half baked.  

Following the discontent in January, they have sat on it and are waiting until (hopefully) UCL is confirmed, to release it, and reduce the backlash.  Its on the walls, undoubtedly on the kit, and its gonna be a lot more difficult to backtrack. 

So Mr Heck thinks he wins, but it could have been such a better rebrand.  He releases a video with Gabby, but who does it fool?  Half statements, "keep the holte" as it is etc etc.  He might have brought in some great increases in revenue, but he is missing so many easy wins with the fans, to really get everything moving 100% in the right direction.

I for one, won't be rushing out to spend my money on anything with this terrible badge.