Outside Advisors

 I have noticed both the city and Univeristy tend to hire outside advisors when making decisions like this.  the city also hired an outside firm to design the new city logo and, under Rita Cheng, the university hired an outside marketing firm to advise in the rebranding and marketing of SIUC. Only thing that came out of that initiative was some banners along the streets on campus.

Always bemused me that neither the city nor the administration  make  more use of the people and departments on campus. SIUC has some very qualified desingers and resarchers and an entired department of amrketing that the administrations could take advantage of but nope, got to an outside firm instead.

Brand Presentation

In case you would like to take a look at the branding presentation for Carbondale presented by NorthStar, you can look it over here. Today's Carbondale Times also has some more background on the logo, including that the purple/maroon top part is actually a C, representing Carbondale and maroon for SIUC.

Carbondale Logo

Above is the new Carbondale logo.  Below it you will typically find the words "Carbondale " and "All Ways Open".  According to Mayor Henry, the logo represents Carbondale's position as both the eclipse crossroads of the nation and Carbondale's position as the "Crossroads of Southern Illinois", with an opening in the center indicating Carbondale's openness to the new. The city paid about $98,000 to the brand development company for this. A few thoughts:

1/  The logo, which will appear throughout the city over the next several months, does not identify which Carbondale. There is a Carbondale, Colorado and a Carbondale, Pennsylvania, along with at least 10 others. Since Carbondale has no iconic imagery incorporated in the logo, it will really need the word "Illinois" to accompany it.

2.  It is pretty bland. I think it looks like a doughnut and I have heard others comparing it to the X-box logo. There is nothing there that could not apply to any other community. Maybe the branding company has their justifications but I see no reason why they could not have incorporated a geodesic dome as a nod to Buckminister Fuller's residency here or replaced the white stripes (roads) with railroad crosshatching, calling to mind Carbondale's past as a rail hub.

3. "All Ways Open" rather sounds like a slogan that could apply to Las Vegas:  "Always Open". Once again, pretty non-specific. Why not refer to something unique about the city like "Gateway to the Shawnee" or "Crossroads of Southern Illinois"?

I'm hoping the city makes Northstar's branding study available. I would like to read through it.