Nickelodeon’s New Brand – Hits Bottom Sans Splat
When you think of the Nickelodeon television station a familiar splat may come to mind, but not anymore. Nickelodeon has decided to rebrand for it’s 30th anniversary eliminating all signs of the splat that reminded us of so many shows from our youth – Double Dare, You Can’t Do That On Television, etc. That’s right, the fun, iconic, dare I say sophomoric splat that defined more than one generation of TV audiences is now circling the drain.
The reason for this as explained by Nick and MTV Network’s Kids and Family Group president, Cyma Zarghami, is:
“The decision to streamline the network identities came after they started putting all of the channels’ logos on the same business card—and decided that it looked like a mess. We wanted to clean it up and allow Nick to be the stamp on all of these channels… In asking ourselves if everything could live under the splat, we decided that the splat was dated. It just couldn’t be done in a streamlined way”
Now that we’ve heard from the brass, lets hear some critiques from their target audience:
Eleven-year-old: “I think the old logo is more exciting for kids. I like the splatter because it looks alive. The new logo is too boring and lacks detail. Being lower case it doesn’t stand out on the poster examples. I do like the Teen Nick look a lot though.”
Fourteen-year-old: “The old logo is more kid friendly and represented who Nick is much better. The new logo is too plain, boring and not as much fun. Does that mean they are doing away with sliming? The Teen Nick logo is better than the new Nickelodeon. At least Teen Nick shows personality.”
And there you have it, out of the mouths of babes…
There has been much debate over what the connection between the lower case “i” and it’s dot is meant to represent – Is it an abstraction of a child? Is it a lame attempt to incorporate the splat somewhere? If you read through some of the comments from other blogs you will see the humorous outcries from the public; it seems this new “arcade retro” logo is a little too web 2.0 trendy for most people, and overall lacking in a more timeless and child friendly design aesthetic.
In the wake of the transitioning brands for Nickelodeon one thing should not be overlooked; that is the childlike simplicity in the 1984 logo design by Scott Nash and Tom Corey for Fred/Alan Inc. It was adapted, developed, and refined for 25 years, one thing is for certain – this new logo will not last nearly as long.
