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Its time for question of the week! I’m going to post a short little audio clip asking you a question. Feel free to chime in and let me know what you think! I’d love to get a discussion going on in the comments!
This week we are discussing the new branding of Melbourne Australia.
Also check out the branding applied to motion design:
Listen up!
[24] Comments
Posted in design, design ethics, Graphic Design, Question Of The Week
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[...] Pricing: How much is too much? [...]
[...] are flourishing within the bounds of their ‘identity standards’. VW, Apple, Zipcar, The City of Melbourne to name a few. These brand identities are in noway stuffy, stiff, or controlling. Its the rules [...]
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curtismchale says:
While I firmly believe that pricing is more than just the hours spent on a design there are two perspectives to look at this from.
1.
If I was a tax payer in Melbourne I would be livid with the needless expense when I’m sure there are items in the city like parks or grafitti that isn’t getting taken care of because of cost.
2.
From a designer perspective it might be an alright price. We have no idea, from the article I read, how much time the company put into the logo. Maybe they had a team of 5 on it for 6 months. It is a much better logo than the old one.
It might also provide a much higher profile and attract tourists both from abroad and local.
So I guess I think it might be okay but I know it would seem silly if my city did that.
July 28th, 2009 at 6:46 am
Roger says:
Hey was just thinking how cool it would be to be able to leave audio comments to your audio question is there a system that lets you do that……
Anyway I think you know my views but I’ll rattle the cages a bit…
Curtis a team of 5 or 6 on a logo for 6 months extreme agency padding to get the most money out of it or really does a logo take that much time and effort to research and design I think from the CoM site 94K was research really did they fly the team to the Bahamas to study water reflections????
Sorry to me the logo is not attractive (that’s a personal opinion and obviously goes with taste)and the fee’s and damn waste…
Why is always the government type agencies that have these unbelievably huge fee’s attached to any project they put out?
Sorry but I would take my pick of 100 Freelance friends at 10% of this price than put this kind of business with an agency and pay that amount of money
July 28th, 2009 at 6:56 am
Menno Pietersen says:
Lets say that work on the new new branding rates about 150 US dollar per manhour (is that a ‘normal’ design rate in Melbourne?):
240.000/150=1600 hours
1600 hours for new branding is really alot but maybe this includes posters, flyers, banners, video, etc.
July 28th, 2009 at 7:05 am
kyle steed says:
If you think about the very foundation of a logo, being able to stand strong in a two-color (black and white) environment, this logo fails completely. It would just end up being a ugly black “M” and you would lose all the “cool” diagonal gradients. Seriously, I could have made this logo when I was 10.
And from a “compare and contrast” approach, it does give a more modern feel to their city. I honestly don’t get the column and the sun? in their old logo. Were they trying to go with an “ancient greek” type of feel?
Overall I think it’s a waste of time, money and effort for the final product.
July 28th, 2009 at 7:08 am
Alex says:
240K can be argued as too much but I would say that in most cases a large price tag for a project like this can be justified. I have often explained large logo price tags in two different ways.
1. You are yes paying for a mark and all around identity, a deliverable item, but you are also, if done right, paying for something with longevity. Something that will ultimately last for years and years. will this logo last for years and years? Not so sure. But part of that large price tag can be seen as your rights of use.
2. The second point goes along with the reasoning for the rebranding of the city. Will this have an effect on tourism, or attracting new businesses to Melbourne? If the research put into the project accounted for those things, and metrics are in place to watch the change over time, the rebranding could result in increased revenue and over time the logo could pay for itself and then some. In the end, the rebranding could result in a lot more then 240K coming back to Melbourne.
As for opinion, I don’t think it is a bad rebranding. I question what it will look like in 8 years. Will it still say Melbourne like it says Melbourne now or will it be a mark associated with a gradient heavy web2.0 era.
I think time will tell if the price was justified.
July 28th, 2009 at 7:15 am
Niki Brown says:
Just for clarification I think both the old and new logos reference architecture in the city. See the comments in this post by Brand New:
http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/pieces_of_melbourne.php
July 28th, 2009 at 7:18 am
Menno Pietersen says:
Quote form Niki Brown’s link:
July 28th, 2009 at 7:25 am
Menno Pietersen says:
Something went wrong.. here the quote
The identity design was developed by the Sydney office of Landor and the City of Melbourne paid $A91,000 (US$74,000) in “preliminary research for the new brand” and $A148,000 (US$120,000) for the design itself according to Doyle. Of course, any dollar amount ignites ire in people and it’s so easy to say “$A240,000 for a fat blocky M?”. Yes, that’s what things cost people, get over it. But back to the identity.
July 28th, 2009 at 7:26 am
curtismchale says:
@Roger
I don’t disagree that if the number I stated are true there is lots of padding in there. It was just a made up number to illustrate the point.
I brought this up at work this morning (lots of non-designers in there) and the non-designers felt strongly that there were many scenarios under which this pricing could be justified.
July 28th, 2009 at 8:54 am
Nikki says:
While I feel that such a large amount of money for a town of Melbourne’s size isn’t that ridiculous considering the amount of exposure it will get, I am not entirely sure that this particular design is worth that much. The gradients are pretty cool, but I feel like even at a slightly diminished size, it’s going to lose what it’s going for. I agree with some of the previous posters – it does just look like an ugly blocky M for the most part.
A good logo, and a good web design for that matter, can come with some pretty hefty price-tags, but it’s hard to say if the price will prove to be the correct one until the public ways in on how popular it will be.
In short, if you’re going to charge that much for a logo, make sure it’s a strong design that will look good no matter where it is or what size it’s shown at.
July 28th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
Brian Klepper says:
I hardly think the City of Melbourne shopped around for a all around package to suit their needs. They had a budget and they met that budget..
This spending may seem outrageous to some, but this ‘identity’ is a global recognized name and will carry out for a very long time. I’ve seen $500,00 identity packages and can’t say Im surprised. It is what it is!
July 28th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
rafael armstrong says:
While the aesthetics and effectiveness of the logo can be argued, the bottom line– to me– on whether a job is overpriced or not (which I think was the original question) is whether or not the client was willing to pay for it. At the end of the day, the folks in Melbourne decided that almost a quarter of a million ($US) was not an unreasonable amount of money to pay for the city’s identity and branding program.
July 28th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
Jono says:
Questioning whether spinning shattered 3D glass is an attribute of Melbourne. I get the glass being tied to the city but not shattering it simply to use a “neat 3D effect.” If it does not clearly enhance or add to the message, then get rid of it. Perhaps zooming in to a pane of the mark’s glass would have been better…it’s completely subjective however.
Overall an improvement towards modern times but I think it could still use some work.
July 30th, 2009 at 4:06 am
Steve Spatucci says:
I agree with Kyle Steed – I’m an old school designer, and the gradients and blending just won’t hold up in many print usages. I do like the colors and the overall shape, and I think it looks better in motion – but you can’t make paper animate (yet).
Once you get over the mid-five figures for a logo, you’re talking about a whole different animal in terms of what’s being purchased – and you’re talking about a very small percentage of clients who can afford that kind of service. I’m sure the research, reviews, meetings (including travel) and number of directions explored was significant. Besides, at some point it’s probably desired that the pricetag be high – for prestige purposes, justification and the P.R. it generates.
July 31st, 2009 at 8:06 am
Youssef Sarhan says:
This is Designer Design.
Spending 250,000 is a luxury, if they had gone to a small studio of 4 people, a lower profile studio, it would have have been just as successful.
They may be able to find the reasons for it being a quarter of a million, but reasons are not excuses. They don’t excuse paying that much.
August 2nd, 2009 at 10:34 am
Randall A. Gordon says:
It all comes down to pure economics and ROI, return on investment. Time to do some math. (You like word problems, don’t you?)
Let’s say we’re budgeting $100,000 for rebranding.
Agency A comes in right at $100,000 with their quote, while Agency B comes at $200,000, twice as much as we had intended to spend. So they should just be kicked to the curb, right?
Wait! Both agencies have done some research, and we backed it up with third party research, so these numbers are indisputable!
What we found is that Agency A’s rebranding will result in an ROI of 1000%, we’re going to make an extra $1,000,000 dollars just from buying the new suit!
However, Agency B wasn’t just quoting you that $200,000 for nothing. Just matching Agency A and giving the same 1000% return would result in $2,000,000 coming back. But there’s even better news. Their rebranding promises an ROI of 2000% and our coffers are now overflowing!
(Economists, accountants and mathematicians beware! I did indeed keep the numbers rounded off!)
Of course, that’s all just made up numbers. The first person who can determine how to make the research and math work out so simple and even in a real world project, please share with the rest of us!
That being said…I, too, am dubious of the ROI on this new rebrand. But, I do have to disagree (somewhat) on their lack of a (decent) monochrome logo choice. About 17 seconds into the video there’s a line art version that could be used to serve the purpose. I’ll concede it is not a great choice, however.
August 2nd, 2009 at 11:14 am
Mark says:
I am a designer from Melbourne.
What angers me most was that this job was sent to an agency in Sydney. How would they know how to represent a city they do not live in.
Melbourne is considered the design capital of Australia, why the hell was this sent to Sydney? There are many very talented designers right here in Melbourne who could have come up with a much better design for a fraction of the cost.
I do not feel this logo in anyway represents the city that I live in. It makes no sense to me.
August 2nd, 2009 at 4:28 pm
Ronnie Roper says:
Bottom line from a sales perspective: You charge what the client is willing to pay. You then have to sell the justification of the costs.
The truth is that a few freelance designers could have created this logo and the city would have paid less, but that’s not what the city wanted. They needed an agency to justify their costs. That’s why freelance designers don’t get big contracts like this, agencies do. Freelancers can’t justify the costs.
Also, to quote Donald Trump when asked “How much is enough?” He said “Just a little bit more.” So how much is too much? When you can’t justify it, it’s too much. or Too much is just a little bit more than the client is willing to pay.
August 2nd, 2009 at 11:55 pm
Fernando says:
When dealing with a state office, there’s always the possibility of corruption involved. Has anyone thought of that? That the reason why it was so expensive is because of someone in the ‘client’ side taking a big chunk out of this 240k? Not saying that this is the reason, but it wouldn’t be the first time that something like this happens… It’s not all about the best design, but also the best pitch, who you know, and what’s in it for everyone involved. Sad, but true.
August 6th, 2009 at 3:47 am
Andrew says:
Well I hate doing this but why not.
Why didn’t it go to a Melbourne agency? because Melbournians arn’t the target audience, they already live there!
Does the Logo represent the city? for me, someone who has been to Melbourne once when I was 7, from what I’m being told by the media and the second hand cultural impression I get, it does.
Does it work? Oddly enough I want to move to Melbourne now.
I like the logo, I think 2 tone it would look horrible, but we’re living in a different time from two tone black and white and if you can drop 240 000 on the rebrand couldn’t you drop 70 bucks on a colour ink cartridge? I’d like to see the brand without the gradients, dumbed down a little to see how it feels then, but otherwise it gets two enthusiastic thumbs up from a Canberran.
So 240 000 worth it?
Yeah. After all, designers are the new rock stars!
August 22nd, 2009 at 6:47 am