March 11, 2004
Branding and Expansion Teams
ESPN gives an interesting look inside the process of creating the brand identity for the Charlotte Bobcats, an expansion NBA team which begins play next season. The article lookes at how they selected the team's nickname from a long list of submissions and then selected a color palette and logo design.
When the team's name and logo were initially unveiled last summer, I had discussions with a number of people about the choices. My view, and that of some others I talked with, were a thumbs up with the name. Despite being almost a cliche name in high school and college sports, there are no professional teams in any league with the name.
I think the team also made a good selection with the color palette for the new team by selecting orange and blue. Orange is an under-used color in pro sports, despite its wide use on the college level (Miami, Illinois, Syracuse, Texas, Princeton).
I wasn't so thrilled when I saw the actual logo, however. I was really hoping that with the retro fashion trends -- both in terms of the retro 50's style t-shirts at Abercrombie & Fitch, etc. as well as the 70's and 80's retro jerseys -- that they'd go in that direction for the logo. One of the logo designs in the article shows they at least thought about going in that direction.
Instead they decided to follow most redesigned logos, and go with the overused profile view tapering to a point -- already used by http://www.panthers.com/, St. Louis Rams, New England Patriots, Nashville Predators, Minnesota Wild, etc.