Gap Inc.: A no go for logo change

Last week, Gap announced it is changing its classic logo, a blue background with all capitalized letters spelling 'G A P.' And the announcement has gotten a lot of negative attention.The new logo, which has a white background and black letters spelling 'Gap'and a blue box in the upper right hand corner, has gotten the company a lot of flack online. The Gap's Twitter and Facebook fans and followers had little good to say about the brand's new image.

The old logo, in my opinion, goes with the preppy and classic look of the store's clothing and accessories. If the store was trying to look as though it has evolved, it missed the mark and gone into devolution. The new logo looks outdated and cold, like a stock exchange logo. Consumers instantly recognize the old Gap logo, so it makes no sense to change the well-branded image.

Some logos don't need to change over time i.e. Coca-Cola and Ford. Sometimes, the brand gets it right on the first try, like in the Gap's case. As a Gap Inc. employee, I think the brand has a great amount of recognition because of its simple and classic logo designs for Gap, Old Navy, Banana Republic, and Piperlime. The simplicity resonates with the Gap audience. The change could negatively effect the brand's advertising because of its recognition and notoriety. Consumers wouldn't be able to easily identify the brand's messages, as they do now, and this could adversly effect the company's sales.

Recently, a mere week after declaring the logo change, the public backlash pushed the company to rescind the change and continue to use the old, classic logo.