Kellogg’s Raisin Bran!
Change. It happens all the time. And one of the most vulnerable items to change is the corporate logo. Or in an extended sense, the corporate cartoon.
There's a big difference between the two, of course. A corporate logo is something like "IBM" – the fonts, the letters, and so forth. If a company has been around for a long time, its logo can become an issue because it was originally created "then" and currently we're at "now." When the difference between then and now gets large (say a few decades), things can start to look dated. Or not. Depends on the original, of course. The really iconic ones tend to have staying power. But for most, a few decades will start to show. And at that point the marketers of a company, wanting to justify their employment, might start to agitate for an update.
Same holds for cartoon imagery, if the company has any. Mr. Clean has been updated continuously. So has Aunt Jemima. And now, so has the Sun-maid raisin girl. Someone in corporate decided that the old girl was too, well old, and needed an update. Here's the original, based on a real live (well, she was alive then) girl, name of Lorraine Collett Petersen:
Sweet and wholesome – that's the image. But is it modern? Is it relevant? Does that matter?
Obviously someone decided it does. And thus Lorraine's image was dumped in favor of the "new look":
What do you think? Better? Worse?
I'll lead off. I don't like it. And here's why. To start, the original artist really tied the whole image together with the company. Sun-maid. Maid rhymes with made. And the sun makes the raisins. And a "maid" is gathering them. Now look at the pic. There's a huge iconic sun centered in the image. In front is our maid. Who's in the process of "making" the raisins. And she's actually working, gathering them up and bringing them from the field. She's the embodiment of the company – a Sun Maid. (I suppose it should be Sun Maiden but that doesn't sound half as good.)
Our new cartoon? The sun is just about gone. Just a small glow in the upper left. And our new girl isn't doing any work anymore, she's just holding up some grapes so we can see what they look like. Silently saying "Check 'em out. Grapes!"
Beyond that? To me she looks like something out of a Shrek film, only more coasely modeled. Just a smooth, plastic "action" figure. Give me a real cartoon or give me somethng realistic. This is in an ill-defined nether-world that simply doesn't appeal. Reminds me more of a Barbi doll, which makes her grapes put me in mind of wax fruit. Not the right image at all.
Imagery is important so don't let this just slide on by. And my opinions are simply that – my opinions. What are YOUR thoughts? Am I raisin a valid issue or just just making an irritating wine?
- And that's today's word from the bird
