Our Logo Design Process
So we know the name is The Wrap Agency but one of the things we love doing is logo design. In fact, sometimes a wrap job starts with that because a client has a new business and doesn’t even have a logo yet. We love the opportunity to be part of a brand and business from the start and what we’ll do in this article is give you a bit of a look-in on what our logo design process looks like from start to finish.
Needs
Most of the time we are creating a logo from scratch, but we also do facelifts or brand refreshes for businesses looking to tweak their current look. We have two basic packages, both of which come with a 30 minute consultation. To make the most of that time, we encourage clients to think about:
what they want their logo to communicate (think in terms of message/energy: flashy and bold or simple and elegant, for example)
what colors they like (think in groups of two or three)
examples of logos they really love (and why)
examples of logos they really hate (and why)
Taking the time to ponder these things means a client can use that consultation time to get on the same page about what the brand represents and how to convey that graphically.
Concepts
Whether you select our standard Logo package or our text-only Simple Logo package, you’re going to get 2-3 concepts from us before we get rolling down one road.
Process-wise we always start in black and white first because we want the client to love the design and concept first (personality) before adding in colors (looks). We can always play with colors to get to the finish line, but if the concept is off, there’s no point in bothering with colors.
Please keep in mind that when it comes to design we HAVE NO FEELINGS. We can see the look on a client’s face as he/she tries to say she really doesn’t like something. Tell us! We won’t take it personally. A logo is really important to get right and you should feel no shame about saying I HATE THIS. When you tell us why you hate something it helps us a) never do it again and b) make sure we don’t go that way with any future iterations.
Once we’ve got the design right, we can move on to making other layouts of the logo, think stacked or horizontal or badge versions for social media or any other uses the client might have.
Color!
Now that we’ve done the hard work of concepting, we’ve earned the right to play with color! Here’s where it’s important to make sure that the colors match the business. For example, ever see a mortuary logo with red in it? Just like there’s a right way to match clothes, there’s a right way to match colors in relation to what a business does. A company involved in sustainability is likely going to have some shade of green somewhere in their logo. And if you’re wondering why fast food chains often have red and yellow it’s because those colors are associated with eating in Western cultures. We’re going to take your preferences and marry them to our expertise to give you some options.
Just as we did in the concepting stage, we will have “revisions” in which we get feedback from the client on likes/dislikes and come back with another version. A certain number of revisions are included with both of our packages and many clients stay within those boundaries but if you want to do more revisions we can accommodate and simply add charges for those revisions onto the final bill.
Files
One of the things new business owners find out is that there’s no such thing as a single logo file. Whether they are building a website, creating a brochure, designing window graphics, or making a wrap for a vehicle or office, business owners are going to want every file type for their logo. You’re going to see file extensions like .ai, .eps, .pdf, .jpeg, .png, .tiff. We’ll tell you more about these article extensions sometime but for now suffice to say we’ll give you every logo file type you’re ever going to need, and if there happens to be some very specialized one you need that you didn’t get, come back to us and we will create that for you!
So that’s it, start to finish: from no logo, to all the logos you need.
We’d love to help you with your logo project. Tell us what you’re thinking!