please empty your brain below
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Thank you for calling out this utter waste of money. Suspect councillors were bamboozled by BS speaking designers (as in the King's New Clothes).
100andthirty | 30.09.23 - 7:10 a.m. | #
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'Attracting investment'? Do people honestly believe that investment is going to rise because the council's logo has been changed?
It also sounds as though the local authority with specialism in branding should increase its fees - it could double them and still be cheaper than a commercial supplier, based on what Merton has said.
Trevor S | 30.09.23 - 7:23 a.m. | #
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More like a cheap housing association logo.
All caps isn't exactly a modern look.
HoosierSands | Homepage | 30.09.23 - 7:23 a.m. | #
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It won't encourage me to watch 'HIGNFY', so money wasted.
Still Anon | 30.09.23 - 7:26 a.m. | #
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Did you trim the edges of the new logo or does it really have an annoyingly tiny gap between legend and edge?
MO | 30.09.23 - 7:28 a.m. | #
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Looks like it’s been put together by the branding team from “Perfect Curve” of comedy series W1A fame.
So it’s all good then.
Terry | 30.09.23 - 7:32 a.m. | #
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Was all this bolx written by a Mrs Merton?
popartist | 30.09.23 - 7:36 a.m. | #
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Complete rubbish. The water wheel logo is perfectly adequate and actually relates to something obvious in the borough. It stands out much better than the bland boring new version.
Dod somebody trying to justify their job within the council think this up?
'No additional cost to the people of Merton'. Homeowners aren't going to get a 'logo change' item on their next council bill, but they are paying for it indirectly. If they have money spare 'within existing budgets', perhaps they could transfer it elsewhere where it is really needed.
rogmi | 30.09.23 - 8:26 a.m. | #
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Feel free to diss the logo but don't complain about the cost.
They waited 30 years, they sourced a design team at 25% of market rate and the initial rollout is only online and "where it can be applied without any additional expenditure".
diamond geezer | Homepage | 30.09.23 - 8:34 a.m. | #
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They should have just gone for “Paul”
Richard | 30.09.23 - 9:11 a.m. | #
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Immediately made me think of those constrictions on paths and bridleways which prevent access by motorcycles. Perhaps on the Wandle Trail?
felix | 30.09.23 - 9:17 a.m. | #
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From time to time organisations will change their logo, and it's legitimate to say that the logo is something which has at least some impact on the perception of the entity which it represents.
The point about being versatile isn't total rubbish either, logos now need to be reproducable in print, on your phone, etc etc and still be recognisable and there's no obvious small or compact version of the outgoing logo.
It's not *all* guff.
That said, the new one is pretty dull, I'm sure some slightly tweaked version of the waterwheel was available.
(At least they kept the colours broadly similar, Harrow's foray into orange and purple was hideous)
Ultimately it's hard to get worked up about this stuff tbh
E | 30.09.23 - 9:41 a.m. | #
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This was probably instigated by a 'passing through' executive, eager to leave their mark.
From my, admittingly limited, experience of working for/within largish corporations their internal Marketing (and HR/Human Resources) departments are usually 'intellectually' estranged from the organisations they serve. And with no concept of the enormous value that an established brand can have. When were the IBM or NASA brands last changed? But most would be able to describe their logos from memory if asked.
Many years ago I worked for a large respected publisher who acquired a small niche business, subscription based publication. Marketing, clueless about brand value,decided to rebrand the new acquisition. Result, a thunderous drop in renewed subscriptions for the niche publication because existing subscribers did not recognise the new brand and it had to be rolled back.
Spirited Director | 30.09.23 - 9:54 a.m. | #
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The first photo is a nice new logo. Well done Merton.
The old London Borough of Merton is rather boring and it was clearly time for a change to something more interesting.
Well done that girl who designed the new water wheel logo. It looks great.
Andrew | Homepage | 30.09.23 - 9:54 a.m. | #
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Shame. The water wheel made the logo stand out from the others. Why couldn't they just alter the styling a bit? Anyway, it's all just corporate P.R. these days.
daveid76 | 30.09.23 - 10:02 a.m. | #
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I think their biggest mistake was trying to justify the change in such pretentious detail (and I see that the full text is even longer, with Titles to each section in case you can't work out why each paragraph is there). A simple "The logo is starting to look old fashioned so we're going to change it but phase it in to minimise the cost" would have done.
Andrew S | 30.09.23 - 10:12 a.m. | #
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The water wheel was a great logo. It represented the borough well.
This is... yeah, I don't know what it is...
Andrew Bowden | Homepage | 30.09.23 - 10:35 a.m. | #
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The explanation of the old logo is curiously non-commital as to whether the water-wheel represents the actual one in Morden Hall Park. The new logo is unsettlingly redolant of two Highland Terriers about the canoodle.
cau1khead | 30.09.23 - 10:40 a.m. | #
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They could have done worse, with something like the present Haringey Council logo (£86k), or the previous Harrow one mentioned by E.
Bob L-S | 30.09.23 - 10:43 a.m. | #
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If you look through the post you should spot a link to a graphic of all 32 borough logos.
diamond geezer | Homepage | 30.09.23 - 10:47 a.m. | #
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I like the waterwheel but I'm sympathetic to the notion that it's not very multipurpose, and the lowercase wide text does look quite dated.
The Barnet and Havering logos, with "London Borough" at the bottom, make me think of Wikipedia disambiguation hatnotes. "This page is about the colloquial term for hair. For the borough, see Barnet (London Borough)."
fheathrenn | 30.09.23 - 10:56 a.m. | #
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Yes the old logo, with its lower case, was perhaps a bit dated, but the new one is just dull, however much pretentious woffle they try to use and justify it...
At least it's not embarrassing like Haringey's though.
Mikey C | 30.09.23 - 11:09 a.m. | #
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Every local history museum and pamphlet mentions the same things: watermills, William Morris, Lord Nelson, Merton Priory, Surrey Iron Railway. I'm surprised the council didn't pick one of those for the new logo.
dg writes: they think they did
Merton resident | 30.09.23 - 11:11 a.m. | #
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I wonder if the council considered changing their name from Merton to Wimbledon? That would increase brand recognition.
MA | 30.09.23 - 11:20 a.m. | #
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Close in design to Croydon.
I wonder what the font is, I suspect Gill Sans (replacing Helvetica)
Expert view of the old logo (Linis Boman), also Jay Forman has had a crack of this topic on Youtube.
MilesT | 30.09.23 - 11:57 a.m. | #
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I concur, Merton 'home to Wimbledon' would've done a lot better at increasing recognition than adding 'the London Borough of' in my opinion.
Think the old logo could've used a slight refresh to make it less disjointed (along with making merton uppercase) and all would have been well.
matthieu1221 | 30.09.23 - 12:00 p.m. | #
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Does anyone know which local authority is running this lucrative sideline knocking out logos? They should be congratulated - it's a contrast with some authorities' ventures into disastrous commercial schemes.
Martin | 30.09.23 - 12:02 p.m. | #
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I... didn't even realise the logo-y bit was supposed to be the letter 'M'.
Also - as a Haringey resident, however many years on I've become almost inured to the inane logo, however I never fail to smile when I see any of the previous versions :)
Sashina | 30.09.23 - 12:24 p.m. | #
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I presume they meant ‘simple’, not ‘simplistic’.
Stephen | 30.09.23 - 2:08 p.m. | #
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Dull, but better than the outgoing design. The waterwheel to me, in these times, implies that nothing of interest happens here. The new M resonates nicely with metropolitan vibes.
Michael T | 30.09.23 - 3:24 p.m. | #
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Waterwheels are quite interesting, I think.
Ian | 30.09.23 - 5:52 p.m. | #
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The waterwheel device was memorable. The 'M' looks suspiciously similar to an upside down 'W'. The planned rebranding of assets on a 'replacement basis' will take decades.
Rod | 30.09.23 - 6:19 p.m. | #
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I have just taken a photograph of a welcome to Merton sign as you approach Shannon Corner from New Malden. It is painted metal and looks in good condition. It should be good for another 20 years - we'll see?!
Ken | 30.09.23 - 6:34 p.m. | #
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Most 'M's look suspiciously similar to an upside down 'W'.
Mrs Prendergast's Hat | 30.09.23 - 6:35 p.m. | #
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H C Anderson "Emperors New Clothes moment".
It is two shapes that look as if they are almost leaning against themselves, not an "M"
Wimbledon branding people may pop their heads above the parapet re branding piracy of the colour combination.
scrumpy | 30.09.23 - 8:29 p.m. | #
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Hmm, indeed! Glad it's not my borough!
I'm getting to know Merton better than I ever expected thanks to its main river so waterwheel to me is perfect. They could just have updated the font!
Slowly morphing into the London Borough of Wimbledon though!
Cornish Cockney | 30.09.23 - 8:30 p.m. | #
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The old logo also has those colours, and the Lawn Tennis Association never complained about that.
Timbo | 30.09.23 - 9:32 p.m. | #
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I'm more curious about the Borough with specialist knowledge who did the work. And what their logo/source of that specialism is (it could just be a single employee who working in Branding before joining the Borough)
Rich (no not that one, the other one) | 01.10.23 - 9:26 a.m. | #
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