A celebration of the finest corporate identities can provide helpful lessons in branding. But a study of those that failed can be just as revealing – and, let’s face it, more fun: Here, we present a rogue’s gallery of logo failures, as chosen by the UK’s leading branding consultants

London 2012

It isn’t clear what the identity represents. That’s a big trick missed when the purpose of creating visual identity is to represent a brand by evoking emotions.

Chris Butterworth, Omobono

Pepsi

It’s lost its consistency as a cultural image – for the first time it looks weak –

an amended logo accompanied by an awful typeface.

Stephen Judge, Bonfire Creative Intelligence 

LG

Probably my least favourite of any major brand. See? The L and G make a face! OMG.

Stan Woods, Velocity 

Capital One

Capital One has put the final nail into the swoosh icon coffin. Typographically it’s awful, the highlight on the swoosh, the shifting baseline, the colour palette... all so non-descript and dated.

Stan Woods, Velocity 

The greatest brand disaster that never happened. Saved from global humiliation by being acquired by IBM. “Tell me why I don’t like Mondays...”

Sholto Lindsay-Smith, Uffindell

Common sense tells you very quickly the name is flawed. It’s not aspirational, it does not have legs; it’s just a gimmick!

Shaun Westgate, Westgate Communications

Kraft Foods

A mish-mash of typefaces and scattered random shapes in an attempt to modernise perceptions. The resulting tangle was confusing and out of line with the brand values.

Debbie Spence, Uffindell

Arlington Pediatric Center, a Polish sausage company and the Brazilian Institute for Oriental Studies

Rather than heap shame on our branding colleagues, we looked for examples from more humble practitioners...

Further

The Office of Government Commerce

Intended to signify a commitment to “driving up standards and capability in procurement”.

Unfortunately, once turned 90 degrees, it resembled a commitment to driving up something else!

James Packer, Uffindell

BP

Lazy brand thinkers so often think they can fool customers with a new logo and nothing else.

But, the insides of organisations always leak out.

Andrew Stothert, Brand Vista

FCUK

Would have been a great ad campaign – cheeky, punchy, rude. But ad campaigns are short lived –

brands are supposed to be built to last, and as a brand FCUK has been a disaster.

Simon Case, Greentarget

Babycham

In the early ‘90s, Babycham’s new label design omitted the iconic fawn, as this was deemed ‘un-cool’ and a hideous blue bottle was introduced.

Charm – even naïve charm – is a very rare quality in branding. Babycham’s deer had this.

Tom Blackett, Siegel + Gale