Spoony Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 15 minutes ago, Keyblade said: This is still so funny to me. I can't believe this is real. The drop shadow, the double outline of the shield, the swapping of the lion and name. The 1874 being white for some reason. Like why does the shield need piping It’s just so bad. It’s not even a grower. How do we get this wrong all the **** time 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keyblade Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 2 minutes ago, Spoony said: It’s just so bad. It’s not even a grower. How do we get this wrong all the **** time It's so bad I'm actually really sad to see our current badge go, as while it's a bit generic it is very clean aesthetically. It's a good looking badge at the end of the day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allani Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 2 hours ago, nick76 said: So why change it from the round badge? It’s the badge the Villa fans picked and even though it’s not the best quality, it’s still ours and now we have going a really good season it will be remembered with it. Yes some Villa fans don’t like it but the majority do like it. If it doesn’t matter to non-Villa fans then let us have our badge and not design a crap one for some corporate smuck in Outer Mongolia who we are trying to get to be our fan but couldn’t name one Villa player, couldn’t pin Villa Park on a map and who used to support Man Utd when they were good. After all it’s just a badge! Yes it’s our bloody badge, the fans badge! I think it was made quite clear (too late in the day admittedly) that the round badge has significant challenges with regards to branding and that it is much harder to make it look unique / stand out from other clubs (all round badges having the same shape whereas you can have a distinct "crest" shape that no other team has - hence it is easier for that shape to be associated with your club / brand). I think this ultimately was an unnecessary distraction caused by the poorly thought-through initial consultation last year / year before. I think we could have avoided this whole mess if the process had been initiated by someone who understood branding - rather than someone who just wanted to do something that was popular. The club should have specified their requirements for the badge (i.e. something where each element is unique to Villa {can be trademarked?} and used in isolation across different media so that we maximised the opportunity to put a Villa "feel" on everything) and then asked the fans for their views - then it would have been clear that a round badge would not meet the requirement of being unique and we'd never have got to the "80% of Villa fans want a round badge so we have to have one". This would have given fans a voice in terms of the design process / final selection but also in ensuring that issues such as colours, the design of the lion, wording, etc were right - but would also have allowed the designers more scope to try things out and then gauge how people felt about them. Maybe there would have still been enough noise about a round badge that we could have found a way to have a roundel "motif" within our catalogue of branding components or retained a commitment to a "retro" catalogue - which we could also use for anniversary / one-off type events. I think that had we done that (either the first time or the second time) then we'd have come up with something really good that met the needs of both the club and the fans and wouldn't have caused half the problems that we've had. It would have been easier to do the first time around (because by the second time it was harder to stipulate the club's needs without it sounding like the "voice" of the fans was being ignored) but by messing up the first time it should have made Heck even more committed to doing it right the second time around. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jas10 Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 56 minutes ago, Keyblade said: This is still so funny to me. I can't believe this is real. The drop shadow, the double outline of the shield, the swapping of the lion and name. The 1874 being white for some reason. Like why does the shield need piping Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villan95 Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 What I still can't get my head around is how after all this we've just ended up with the Lerner badge with tweaks. I thought the whole point of changing the badge was to get away from that era. It was meant to be representing the new and improved Aston Villa. Very disappointing. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thabucks Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 (edited) I’d hope that the drop shadow version is either the digital version, or a physical one whereby the lion is raised out of the badge to create a shadow and that for the kits they will go down the monochrome route. Looking at it full screen on my 65’ tv from a distance it looks Ok with the shadow and adds depth. The badge isn’t the best but also not the worst thing in the world. Just think a few simple tweaks in the colour and shield shape and it’s nailed. I do also think the lion should be facing the same direction as the current placeholder round badge myself … Edited January 11 by thabucks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allani Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 1 hour ago, Marka Ragnos said: I think getting rid of "Prepared" motto was unfortunate. The thing that's interesting is that Emery often talks about the Villa "family" with great warmth, and heraldic mottos definitely connect to the idea of a powerful family. I would love to see a modern updated take on our original heraldic motto -- FORWARD. I kind of agree - although I do think that we could have a "collection" of these that are used as part of our wider "brand" catalogue - "Prepared", "Part of the Pride", "The Villa Family", something like you say about moving forward, building for the future, etc. I don't think they'd appear on the badge but could be used as supporting components in specific scenarios. I seem to recall that this is something that Heck did pretty well before - there was a base brand and then that was supplemented with additional elements to support specific themes / strategies and also entitities that weren't part of the main club and so the branding of them made them easy to differentiate from the club but retained enough of the brand concepts to make it clear that they were part of the wider family. It all looked pretty slick. Which is part of the reason why I'm disappointed that so far things appear to be less co-ordinated, less professional and less inspiring. Hopefully that changes ... and quickly. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thabucks Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 Also the whole process with the now mandatory fan engagement is flawed and has stifled creativity IMO coupled with NSWE wants as well. Fans wanted full name, founding year and the star (poss direction the lion looks) the owners wanted a shield by the sounds of it over the round badge. Yes some have produced better both online and on here for sure, a lot are just plain bad as well though. It has been messed around with by Purlsow & Heck and NSWE. The current round placeholder badge is meh to me but it does represent our historic champions cup winning season but remember that the majority of our proud 150 year history has been with a shield. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thabucks Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 1 minute ago, allani said: I kind of agree - although I do think that we could have a "collection" of these that are used as part of our wider "brand" catalogue - "Prepared", "Part of the Pride", "The Villa Family", something like you say about moving forward, building for the future, etc. I don't think they'd appear on the badge but could be used as supporting components in specific scenarios. Don’t forget the Proud History - Bright Future! one of the best games I’ve been to was when every fan at the Sheff UTD game received a free scarf with that on. Cracking day and one thing Lerner did to make us proud again to be Villans. Along with restoring the Holte Hotel and Mosaic's. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allani Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 11 minutes ago, villan95 said: What I still can't get my head around is how after all this we've just ended up with the Lerner badge with tweaks. I thought the whole point of changing the badge was to get away from that era. It was meant to be representing the new and improved Aston Villa. Very disappointing. I think they've tried deliberately to ensure that it's not a huge jump and that they can show that the new brand is not a major departure from what was there before. Unfortunately I think they've misread the room and not realised that many fans would be quite happy for a pretty major revamp of the Lerner badge - specifically with regard to the colours. I think they've tried to play too safe for fear of upsetting the apple cart and ended up doing just that (and maybe worse). 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allani Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 2 minutes ago, thabucks said: Don’t forget the Proud History - Bright Future! one of the best games I’ve been to was when every fan at the Sheff UTD game received a free scarf with that on. Cracking day and one thing Lerner did to make us proud again to be Villans. Along with restoring the Holte Hotel and Mosaic's. Good point. I am also sure that someone smarter than me could come up with something along that message that tied in with the lion theme. Pride is such a great word that works for Villa on multiple levels. I mean there's a danger of turning it into something cliched but done right it could be really neat (or whatever word we should be using in 2024!). 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villan95 Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 (edited) 9 minutes ago, allani said: I think they've tried deliberately to ensure that it's not a huge jump and that they can show that the new brand is not a major departure from what was there before. Unfortunately I think they've misread the room and not realised that many fans would be quite happy for a pretty major revamp of the Lerner badge - specifically with regard to the colours. I think they've tried to play too safe for fear of upsetting the apple cart and ended up doing just that (and maybe worse). Yeah maybe, and if they had just said "we'll be modifying the badge" and it had gone from the Lerner badge to this one I don't think it would have gone down so badly. The problem is it replacing the round badge we could have had, where most agree it feels like a step backwards and a step down. Edited January 11 by villan95 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nick76 Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 27 minutes ago, thabucks said: Just think a few simple tweaks in the colour and shield shape and it’s nailed. A lot of tweaks, that it’s better to start again. Even the fans ones that have a remote similarity to it,and look much much better, are significantly tweaked. It’s just so bad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Marka Ragnos Posted January 11 VT Supporter Popular Post Share Posted January 11 (edited) 40 minutes ago, villan95 said: Yeah maybe, and if they had just said "we'll be modifying the badge" and it had gone from the Lerner badge to this one I don't think it would have gone down so badly. The problem is it replacing the round badge we could have had, where most agree it feels like a step backwards and a step down. 33 minutes ago, nick76 said: A lot of tweaks, that it’s better to start again. Even the fans ones that have a remote similarity to it,and look much much better, are significantly tweaked. It’s just so bad Our badge process has become the Man United of badge processes. Edited January 11 by Marka Ragnos 2 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enda Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 The “hard to distinguish from a marketing perspective” is an ill-fated approach, in my view, on two fronts. Firstly, every actual fan recognizes it immediately. The only people who don’t recognize it are people the club are trying to attract. The focus is thus on potential new fans, rather than the existing life-long supporters. That’s a mistake, in my view. Secondly, I reject the premise that this should be dictated by the marketing team. Football is a business, I know, and revenue generation is important. I know. But the crest of the club is something too important to be left up to the marketing team. It’s iconic. Handing the reins to Johnny in marketing (or Chris H) is cheap and short-sighted. Give it more class, you money-grabbing dickwads. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fruitvilla Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 1 hour ago, allani said: Pride is such a great word that works for Villa on multiple levels. Philosophically "pride" is something I would not want to go near. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spoony Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 2 hours ago, thabucks said: Don’t forget the Proud History - Bright Future! one of the best games I’ve been to was when every fan at the Sheff UTD game received a free scarf with that on. Cracking day and one thing Lerner did to make us proud again to be Villans. Along with restoring the Holte Hotel and Mosaic's. Lerner was generally pretty good at making the fans happy, hearing what the fans had to say and understanding the club. Ultimately probably part of his downfall as he wasn’t ruthless with MON or anything else and we ran up massive losses. So maybe this is just the price that we have to pay. Fans now get shafted in everything but at least we are financially stable. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Davkaus Posted January 11 Popular Post Share Posted January 11 13 minutes ago, Spoony said: Lerner was generally pretty good at making the fans happy, hearing what the fans had to say and understanding the club. Ultimately probably part of his downfall as he wasn’t ruthless with MON or anything else and we ran up massive losses. So maybe this is just the price that we have to pay. Fans now get shafted in everything but at least we are financially stable. Yup, the acorns deal, the occasional free trinkets (still got both my Sheffield free scarf and my Ajax one), the mosaic, the rather unheard of fan engagement of Krulak posting on here (even if it went a bit sour), the Holte pub. His heart was in the right place. If it wasn't for Man City, FFP and his divorce, we'd probably have ended up winning a thing or two and thinking rather more highly of him. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allani Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 1 hour ago, Enda said: The “hard to distinguish from a marketing perspective” is an ill-fated approach, in my view, on two fronts. Firstly, every actual fan recognizes it immediately. The only people who don’t recognize it are people the club are trying to attract. The focus is thus on potential new fans, rather than the existing life-long supporters. That’s a mistake, in my view. Secondly, I reject the premise that this should be dictated by the marketing team. Football is a business, I know, and revenue generation is important. I know. But the crest of the club is something too important to be left up to the marketing team. It’s iconic. Handing the reins to Johnny in marketing (or Chris H) is cheap and short-sighted. Give it more class, you money-grabbing dickwads. On the second point - I strongly disagree. If I want a new house the last people designing that house should be me and my family. We don't know what is possible and would probably draw something that strongly resembled our favourite previous house. Sure we have a role to play in terms of describing some of the elements that the house must have to make it work for the way that we live / want to live. But I'd 100% employ an architect to actually come up with a few ideas, to try and blow my mind in terms of what could be done, etc. I'd also want at least one of their proposals to be something quite radically different to everywhere I'd lived before - it might be unlikely that that would be the design that I would pursue but there could well be elements of it that I really liked that I might want to be incorporated into something a bit more me. Obviously, I would then expect a bit of to and fro in terms of - I like these elements from House 1, these from House 2, I really dislike this part of House 1, etc. That's the bit we seem to have skipped. In terms of following my analogy above - it's like first time the architect just took my drawing of the house I grew up in, changed a couple of colours on the walls and moved the garage from the left to the right. Second time around it's like he's said - hmm that looked a bit generic so what he'll do instead is re-draw my current house but change the placement of the stairs because that was something I said I didn't like (but not addressing any of the other things I didn't like). 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allani Posted January 11 Share Posted January 11 24 minutes ago, Davkaus said: Yup, the acorns deal, the occasional free trinkets (still got both my Sheffield free scarf and my Ajax one), the mosaic, the rather unheard of fan engagement of Krulak posting on here (even if it went a bit sour), the Holte pub. His heart was in the right place. If it wasn't for Man City, FFP and his divorce, we'd probably have ended up winning a thing or two and thinking rather more highly of him. I also loved the fact that he sent me a certificate showing the shares that I had in the club when it was listed on the stock exchange. The shares were always of far more sentimental value to me (I "own" a part of my football club) and so I thought it was brilliant that he recognised the human element of that. Sure I no longer owned any part of the club but I still have something I can put on the wall to say that I did. He did a lot of really good things when he first bought the club - just a shame that he got a lot of really bad advice from people who he thought knew what they were talking about. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts