Gap and the power of the Crowd

I thought this was interesting and another indication of how the power has shifted to the consumer through the ability to communicate through social networks and of course the ubiquitous Facebook. Gap, the global clothing chain, has backtracked on a substantial relaunch of its renowned logo just days after it was unveiled.

The new logo – three black letters and a small blue square – provoked a storm of online abuse from both customers and graphic designers on blogs after it was unveiled on Gap’s US website last Monday.

Three days later the company used its Facebook page to announce that it was “thrilled to see passionate debates unfolding”, but was seeking alternative ideas from its fans and critics through a “crowd sourcing” project.

“We love our version, but we’d like to ... see other ideas,” the statement said.

So what this means, reading between the lines, is that after two years of working with Laird & Partners, a New York design agency, they are going to be ditching the new logo and asking the consumer to come up with ideas. Maybe they should have thought about this in the first place and the huge positive publicity that could have been gained, the fantastic consumer dialogue and engagement that would have taken place and who knows they might have even got a logo most people liked.

Times they are a changing.....