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Super Bowl LII logo


NYCdog

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4 hours ago, BringBackTheVet said:

 

Why would they think it's a failure?  Because some people on an internet message board are complaining?  I doubt there's any tangible measure that indicates it's a failure.  I guarantee that if SB merch sales were down they'd scrap it.  

 

Why I think it's good (at least conceptually - I do think some of these could have been executed better)

1.  It "brands" the superbowl.  You see a mark with the Lombardi trophy and roman numerals and you instantly think Super Bowl.  You're not looking at flowers or mardi gras hats or other stuff and having to read the words SUPER BOWL.  To sports nerds you'd see it once and then associate it with the Super Bowl, but it's probably not that way for everyone.

 

2.  It creates a genuine icon for the Super Bowl.  It's tough to have an iconic logo with something that changes every year (the numbers, subtle color shades, etc.) but they've given it an iconic element (the trophy) and iconic theme if not an iconic mark.

 

3.  It's special to see the logo on the jerseys now.  It's like you play every year for the right to wear the Lombardi patch on your jersey.  It's kinda like the Stanley Cup patch in the NHL.   Also in photos you can instantly tell what SB it is by the patch.  You don't have to stare at it for more than a second.  

 

4.  It's just classy and IMO looks more prestigious on a jersey.

 

Now if you want local logos for use in the host cities or as alternate marks (kinda like the hosting committee logos) then maybe that would be OK, but I fear that it would dilute the brand.

 

 

This x1000.

 

It's kinda silly that there are still people here who believe that it is a genuinely bad move by the league to standardize the brand for the goshdang Super Bowl simply because they miss seeing the charming regional marks they could come up with. Yeah, those were pretty great and will always have a place in our hearts (particularly the Jacksonville one for me:P), but they just do not work for what the Super Bowl has become in the modern age, which is a big MF-ing deal. Big MF-ing deals like the Super Bowl don't cut it with that sort of cutesie flair. A solid brand is part of makes the Super Bowl so great and prestigious.

 

Check the last two logos for New Orleans Super Bowls. With only but a quick glance, the average person could tell you that one of these is definitely the Super Bowl, the Big One, the ultimate culmination of the NFL season, the biggest sporting event of the year. The other, however, is a bit harder until you take the time to read the text. Is it the 31st anniversary of the Mardi Gras parade? It's a toughy without more than a little visual effort, which is a very important aspect of branding that the NFL ought not to ignore.

 

image.pngimage.png

 

I also think that something that people are ignoring is that the jazzy regional logos only really lasted from Super Bowl XVII to XXXIX. All of the ones before that and XL through XLIV are generic and non-regionalized even if they are all different, which may be worse than regionalization. XL was the true death of the cute logos, and was likely when the league realized that the game itself was a lot bigger than the city that was hosting it.

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11 hours ago, BringBackTheVet said:

1.  It "brands" the superbowl.  You see a mark with the Lombardi trophy and roman numerals and you instantly think Super Bowl.  You're not looking at flowers or mardi gras hats or other stuff and having to read the words SUPER BOWL.  To sports nerds you'd see it once and then associate it with the Super Bowl, but it's probably not that way for everyone.

 

2.  It creates a genuine icon for the Super Bowl.  It's tough to have an iconic logo with something that changes every year (the numbers, subtle color shades, etc.) but they've given it an iconic element (the trophy) and iconic theme if not an iconic mark.

 

Right.  Even though I don't give a fig about the Super Bowl, I hear that there are some people who are into that sort of thing.   So this gigantic event should have a steady, consistent logo.  The idea of a new logo each year was actually kind of cheesy.

 

Also, they got the look right.  The marble-like look of the figures conveys the right amount of gravitas.  By contrast, the World Series logos of recent years have been lacking in character, often veering into the silly. 

 

Major League Baseball at one time had a nice aesthetic for its World Series logos.  The 1980-86 logos were simple and dignified.

 

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But they really hit the jackpot with the next logo, lasting from 1987 through 1991, which featured a script characteristic of baseball superimposed over a baseball diamond.

 

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They should have kept this for good.  This says "baseball's fall classic" better than any logo before or since.

After that they started tinkering, changing the logo every year.  They first inserted a globe, then they employed faux-3D.  They finally succeeded in stripping the whole thing of any aesthetic value by descending into typefaces more associated with video games.  Last year's logo was inoffensive by comparison to the messes that immediately preceded it, but was a bit charmless.

Anyway, the thing to do is to abandon the yearly logo-go-round, and to just pick one design and stick with it for a long time, so as to establish a consistent visual identity, as the NBA has done with its Finals logo, whose basic design has been around for about a decade and a half.

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  So, in that respect, the NFL has got it exactly right with its recent Super Bowl logos.

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6 hours ago, Gupti said:

Check the last two logos for New Orleans Super Bowls. With only but a quick glance, the average person could tell you that one of these is definitely the Super Bowl, the Big One, the ultimate culmination of the NFL season, the biggest sporting event of the year. The other, however, is a bit harder until you take the time to read the text. Is it the 31st anniversary of the Mardi Gras parade? It's a toughy without more than a little visual effort, which is a very important aspect of branding that the NFL ought not to ignore.

 

image.pngimage.png

 

Just wanted to point out that there was another Super Bowl in New Orleans in between the 2 you presented above. And, of course, we all know the story about the logo changing due to the 9/11 attacks. I think there's merit to both sides of the argument. But I'm not sure you can say that people were unable to identify the logo as a "Super Bowl" logo when they all had the text across the design. I do think that it makes sense to have unified branding for the game...but I also like the creation of the regionalized logos that we've seen since the change in mindset. I just wish that those designs were a little better and more prominent nationally.

 

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Have to say that there is cause to see both sides of this argument.  The Super Bowl is a brand at this point.  The NFL is starting to treat it as such.  Unfortunately they have gone about it in the blandest way possible where it's cold and heartless.  There's no "soul of the city" behind them anymore like they used to be, even if in the overall view it was a short amount of time.  For LI and LII it feels like they are at least introducing some color into it, which is much better than it was, but still lacks in ways. 

 

What they need to do is standardize the Roman Numerals better with the Lombardi, even if the precious shield is obscured by the Letters, and then create an interchangeable backdrop that can reflect the city/area/region that the game is taking place.  that way it can satisfy the want of differentiating logos for different sites, but also maintain the standardization that they are striving for but continuously missing the mark of.


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The NBA Finals logo shown above is a great example of championship branding. Combined with the Larry Obrien patch it instantly lets you know what your watching and that it's a BFD. 

 

They really screwed things up when they did the giant trophies at mid court. 

"The views expressed here are mine and do not reflect the official opinion of my employer or the organization through which the Internet was accessed."

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21 hours ago, Gupti said:

 

This x1000.

 

It's kinda silly that there are still people here who believe that it is a genuinely bad move by the league to standardize the brand for the goshdang Super Bowl simply because they miss seeing the charming regional marks they could come up with. Yeah, those were pretty great and will always have a place in our hearts (particularly the Jacksonville one for me:P), but they just do not work for what the Super Bowl has become in the modern age, which is a big MF-ing deal. Big MF-ing deals like the Super Bowl don't cut it with that sort of cutesie flair. A solid brand is part of makes the Super Bowl so great and prestigious.

 

Check the last two logos for New Orleans Super Bowls. With only but a quick glance, the average person could tell you that one of these is definitely the Super Bowl, the Big One, the ultimate culmination of the NFL season, the biggest sporting event of the year. The other, however, is a bit harder until you take the time to read the text. Is it the 31st anniversary of the Mardi Gras parade? It's a toughy without more than a little visual effort, which is a very important aspect of branding that the NFL ought not to ignore.

I'd argue this is largely a false dilemma; it's possible to both have creative logos and consistently incorporate the item you're trying to turn into the game's symbol. The World Cup (which, incidentally, is a much bigger "MF-ing deal" than the Super Bowl) has been doing this since 2002 and it's worked to great success, allowing them to both benefit from the branding that comes from the recognizability of a single trophy and additional sales that come from having easily differentiable merchandise. There's clearly middle ground to be found that allows for ample branding and some degree of artistic creativity.

 

In this instance, a simple workaround would be to just require the use of the Lombardi in any official logo design. If you're really worried about branding, require that it be front and center, and then let artists work around that.

rsz_screen_shot_2017-02-13_at_32545_pm.png

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  • 3 months later...

They use the super bowl committee logo or some alternate because they know the logos are weak so what is the deal? Roger being a control freak? Because nothing says brand from 2011 on...it just says that they aren't going to put much thought into designing anything iconic. They are acting like the madden of life. Little to no real change because...we are the brand we are the game we have no competition so who cares?!

IMG_4640.PNG

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The standard Super Bowl logo is terrible. It only works when you add the roman numerals, stadium and color.

 

843px-Super_Bowl_logo.svg.png

 

Look at that. LOOK AT IT. That's the actual logo for the biggest game in sports. If you look up Super Bowl on Wikipedia this is the logo that represents the game. You even see it in Madden. That's a miserable looking logo for what is the biggest championship game in all of sports.

bSLCtu2.png

 

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The problem with the “don't question their branding, they know what they're doing” argument is that it means everything they do is good and refutation is pointless. From the 9ers scrapped logo 25 years ago to the flubbed LA Chargers logo this year... not only does the NFL does not always get it right, but fan reactions actually matter. “Too big to fail” is a myth. I agree that standardization and Lombardi-centric design makes sense in terms of consistent branding, but just because the concept of a standardized logo makes sense does not mean the NFL got it right with their specific interpretation.

 

Besides, claims that the old annual custom logos didn't properly brand the Super Bowl during the era when the league exploded in popularity seem baseless... maybe none of this logo nonsense matters after all ;)

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Honestly, you knew it was the Super Bowl because the big roman numerals across it. The Super Bowl was the only time you EVER saw roman numerals put front and center like that in advertising or marketing.

 

Seeing the 'bland' modern logos is ridiculous because even the NFL uses 'site' logos. I have memorabilia of two different Super Bowls, and the 'site' logo is the one shown prominently. The main one was from SB XLIX. The orange/blue logo is the marquee, while the little gray 'stamp' in the corner is the only marking of the 'official' logo.

 

Since near the beginning, the NFL has used a 'new' logo for each iteration of the Super Bowl. MLB went decades without any logo. To suddenly foist one upon it would be discounting the era before a logo. So, their logos tend to be far less memorable for a reason. "World Series", just the words, is all that's needed for a sport that has lived and breathed through four forms of media. And you can argue the popularity of baseball, it's attendance numbers dwarf other leagues. So, someone's buying.

 

For NHL, the Stanley Cup existed before the league ever did and even in its infancy, the NHL has always had to promote the "Stanley Cup" above any other name they could give it. NHL Championship does, and always will, feel inferior to what it's widely accepted as NHL's championship tournament "The Stanley Cup Playoffs," The Stanley Cup Finals," etc.

 

For NBA, it's new. Had no 'a ha' moment for thinking of a name or a word or imagery that embodies it the way "Super Bowl" does to NFL, "Stanley Cup" does to NHL, or "World Series" does to MLB. Instead, the NBA has the blandest championship name of them all "NBA Finals". It's like the end of your semester in high school.

 

But, since they're the only major professional league in the U.S. to basically only promote their championship round as "Finals", it became accustomed to being associated with just the NBA. Though the NHL are the "Stanley Cup Finals", you will never see a puckhead call them just the "Finals".

 

But for all the imagery and 'brand awareness' of the NBA, they still just call them "The Finals" in the most uninspiring way possible because they KNOW you know what they mean when they say it. It doesn't need to be shoved down your throat.

 

This idea we won't know what the Super Bowl is unless all the decals look the same, or the contours of the Lombardi Trophy aren't consistently shoved into your eyeballs makes me think the NFL is compensating for something they're lacking. Rather than the brash, cocky arrogance the NFL once had and didn't need to tell you who they were.

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RE: Creating a brand for the Super Bowl

 

I think the thing about it with me is it's not designed well. It's chrome numbers with a roman numeral under it. It's disconnected and they have to release a flat version of the logo for patches. However I get where BBTV is coming from with an icon. It's unapologetically "Super Bowl" and I've come to hate it less and less since the first one they did.

 

That being said, this is how you do it.

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9 hours ago, Sykotyk said:

Honestly, you knew it was the Super Bowl because the big roman numerals across it. The Super Bowl was the only time you EVER saw roman numerals put front and center like that in advertising or marketing.

 

Seeing the 'bland' modern logos is ridiculous because even the NFL uses 'site' logos. I have memorabilia of two different Super Bowls, and the 'site' logo is the one shown prominently. The main one was from SB XLIX. The orange/blue logo is the marquee, while the little gray 'stamp' in the corner is the only marking of the 'official' logo.

 

Since near the beginning, the NFL has used a 'new' logo for each iteration of the Super Bowl. MLB went decades without any logo. To suddenly foist one upon it would be discounting the era before a logo. So, their logos tend to be far less memorable for a reason. "World Series", just the words, is all that's needed for a sport that has lived and breathed through four forms of media. And you can argue the popularity of baseball, it's attendance numbers dwarf other leagues. So, someone's buying.

 

For NHL, the Stanley Cup existed before the league ever did and even in its infancy, the NHL has always had to promote the "Stanley Cup" above any other name they could give it. NHL Championship does, and always will, feel inferior to what it's widely accepted as NHL's championship tournament "The Stanley Cup Playoffs," The Stanley Cup Finals," etc.

 

For NBA, it's new. Had no 'a ha' moment for thinking of a name or a word or imagery that embodies it the way "Super Bowl" does to NFL, "Stanley Cup" does to NHL, or "World Series" does to MLB. Instead, the NBA has the blandest championship name of them all "NBA Finals". It's like the end of your semester in high school.

 

But, since they're the only major professional league in the U.S. to basically only promote their championship round as "Finals", it became accustomed to being associated with just the NBA. Though the NHL are the "Stanley Cup Finals", you will never see a puckhead call them just the "Finals".

 

But for all the imagery and 'brand awareness' of the NBA, they still just call them "The Finals" in the most uninspiring way possible because they KNOW you know what they mean when they say it. It doesn't need to be shoved down your throat.

 

This idea we won't know what the Super Bowl is unless all the decals look the same, or the contours of the Lombardi Trophy aren't consistently shoved into your eyeballs makes me think the NFL is compensating for something they're lacking. Rather than the brash, cocky arrogance the NFL once had and didn't need to tell you who they were.

 

I think the NBA has a trademark on "The Finals" (plural, no league name) now. I've noticed in the last 10 years or so, at least, the NHL has been very careful to call it the "Stanley Cup Final" (singular).

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  • 7 months later...

I hate bumping old topics so apologies if this causes the thread to be locked but I feel this is relevant.  Since the matchup is finalized for Super Bowl LII, we're starting to see some of the """""alternate""""" logos get rolled out that help break up the standardized format and kinda give a local flair.  Figured i'd update this with some of what i'm currently finding that also appears on merchandise

 

Super-Bowl-LII-Things-To-Do-1360x775.jpe

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Can see that the LII is made of vertical lines that taper at the top, and there is a diagonal line that runs from the bottom left upwards.  Would be nice if they included these graphics as part of the full package rather than just the systematic logo.

 


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The problem I have with the logos for 45 to 49 is that is is really hard to tell them apart. 

 

I was having lunch the other day and saw a guy in a black hoodie with one of the Super Bowl logos on it (no other logos, just a black hoodie with the SB logo on the left breast). The problem was that, from a glance, you can't tell which SB it was. I had to get close to look at the roman numerals to tell. Had it been any previous logo, I could install identify it, but because it was in that era of logos, it was hard to tell. 

 

I think a SB logo should be instantly recognizable. Super Bowl XXXVIII has a lot going on and if you just wrote it out, like I did not, you might not install know what game I'm talking about, but the logo for the game is so recognizable that I instantly knew that it was NE vs CAR in Houston. That logo reminded me of everything I needed to know. I could't tell you who played in XLVII or where it was by looking at the logo, I'd have to take a min to think about it.

 

What I do like with the SB 50 logo to now is that they have color to them. They are not perfect by any means, but I do remember who played in those games as they are more instantly recognizable I hope the trend continues, but frankly, I want them go go back to the format they had for SB XL to XLIV. A unique logo that represents the location that the game is played in, with red and blue stars for the AFC and NFC, and something colorful. XLIII is the weakest of the group sure, but for a time I really liked the SB logos. I really thought XLV was an outlier and that it was just for that year. How wrong I was. 

 

Simply put: more color and more uniqueness!

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I love that this attempt to suck the fun out of a major sporting event’s design is basically failing without a concerted clear effort on the part of the NFL. It shows that it was just such a bad idea that it’s being undermined from a bunch of places.

concepts: washington football (2017) ... nfl (2013) ... yikes

potd 10/20/12
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13 hours ago, Pharos04 said:

I hate bumping old topics so apologies if this causes the thread to be locked but I feel this is relevant.  Since the matchup is finalized for Super Bowl LII, we're starting to see some of the """""alternate""""" logos get rolled out that help break up the standardized format and kinda give a local flair.  Figured i'd update this with some of what i'm currently finding that also appears on merchandise

 

Super-Bowl-LII-Things-To-Do-1360x775.jpe

ff_2878676_full.jpg&w=340ff_2873465_full.jpg&w=340ff_3038718_full.jpg&w=340

 

Can see that the LII is made of vertical lines that taper at the top, and there is a diagonal line that runs from the bottom left upwards.  Would be nice if they included these graphics as part of the full package rather than just the systematic logo.

 

 

For reference, how it compares to 51. Lines baby.

 

Judging by the colors of 52’s branding, it seems like the theme this year is centered around auroras. Last year was space. 

 

SBLIThemeArt2.jpg

NYCdog.png
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