GAP logo redesign: If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.
Under - Advertising, Design, Media, TypographyGap unveiled their new logo few days back that nobody seems to like – designers to consumers alike. I’m completely stunned to see this redesign getting approved and released for a brand that took more than 20 years to build and doing business over billions of dollars a year!
Gap logo redesign - before (left) and after (right)
The redesign not only looks unprofessional but ridiculous and non-serious as well from a company that already owns owned an iconic symbol. It appears to be a quick comp in MS Word by someone without a sense of direction, confidence and leadership.
Logo redesign is closely aligned with branding and any negativity around brand symbol sure hurts businesses very hard. Gap is now trying to engage with the consumers for suggestions to avoid the continued backlash around this redesign which took place in the name of ‘modernisation’.
On Brand New website, an overwhelming majority of 90% visitors voted this evolution as ‘bad’.
Good.is published an article applying the Gap redesign approach to some well-known logos which shows how simple it is to destroy years’ hard work.
Advertising, Brand, Business/Finance, Communication, Communication design, Design, Gap, Graphic design, Logos, Mass media, Media, Typography 
WordPress 
5 thoughts to “GAP logo redesign: If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.”
Travis Ulrich
The “if it it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” model is a too short-term thinking in the marketing world where the “if you’re not growing, you’re dieing” model is applied.
While I’m not thrilled about The Gap’s new logo, it was time to re-evaluate their marketing direction refresh the brand. I talk about this is some detail on my blog (cheap plug!!!).
Now that The Gap has opened a dialogue with the public, it’ll be interesting to see what the final outcome is. My prediction is that they’ll probably stick to their guns but an interesting idea could be for them to “bring back” the old logo with a more modern font. That would be an interesting way of refreshing the brand and making their customers feel like greater stakeholders.
Asif Naqvi
Travis – interesting point “if you’re not growing, you’re dieing” if this is applied to Gap then it is already dead.
I found some great logo evolution examples here something that Gap should have looked at before ‘modernising’ their logo.
Mars
i dont really get why would such big company try to have a logo, where in they were already established with their old logo
Asif Naqvi
So here it ends: Gap to Scrap New Logo, Return to Old Design
Lesson learnt: If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.
Daniel
It’s a shame! The first one was so elegant and clean, besides the brand was so original. Now, it’s look like an agencie or something like that..
But, as Asif Naqvi said, Gap return to the old version. This is good, but they didn’t have to choose the new logo as well.
NOTE: Comments may be held for moderation. If your comment does not appear immediately, do not repost. Any inappropriate or irrelevant comments will be removed. By submitting a comment you grant LivingDesign.info a perpetual license to reproduce your words and name in attribution.