Advice for working with logo designers

You can post freely. I don't see a problem with that.

If you feel the need to post the designer's work up here for a critique, then I'd suggest finding yourself a different designer to work with.

I'm not by any means suggesting that the one you are working with is bad, just that the working relationship you have with them, and the way in which they engage with you can't be right if you require an assortment of (highly talented) strangers to comment on their work.

Personally, if I were the designer, I would either work with you to help find the communications problem, or bow out at this point.

The best way to make your mind up about a logo is to ask an opinion to as many people as possible. A logo (a bit like a website) is not about what the designer thinks of it, it's about how the end user ((the customer) perceives it. Many times a design which is technically rich and well balanced will be turned down in favour of a more simplistic project.

I'm curious as hell about what the brief was on this project and the designers' answers to it, however I agree with Alex. I would have a tough time judging another designer's work who has clearly stated that they do not wish it posted here.

If the relationship with your supplier has come to this point, then perhaps it might be best to pay them for the time they've invested on this project and look for another whose work you like. Do some research on your next designer, searching for a style and/or experience designing for the music field.

Good luck.
3dog

The design firm has a point and they don't at the same time when they say they don't want design by committee.

Outside critique is good to throw out ideas you might be unsure of. However, if you don't know what you want in the first place, no amount of critique is going to help you find it.

What I want to see first is the brief you sent the design company, as that will give us a lot more insight than seeing the results of that brief.

To make things clear,

This is the second design company we're working with. It was the previous one that did not want the committee to review their work and I do respect that. What I did not necessarily respect was a rude response that we got from them so we moved to other design company.

Now the brief for the current logo design is basically as follows:

Company Name:
twelvebars.com.au , 12bars.com.au

The type of business:
Online music resource for unsigned music and independent music businesses. Australia wide. We promote and sell unsigned artists, promote independent music businesses and support the independent music scene. The domain name was thought from the classic 12 bar blues chord progression. If you need anything further please let us know. We would like to accommodate from the classical to hard rock etc. Logo should be professional, independent, different? Possibly…

Additional comments:
Please provide concept or two using each of the twelvebars.com.au and 12bars.com.au addresses as we’re unsure which will be best at this stage.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Any comments appreciated

Personally, I wouldn't want my designs going thru a committee either. Many times that committee includes people like the secretary and the boss' secret mistress who add "critique" like "the colors don't match the lobby". Once the logo is designed and the client and designer feel they have made a choice - THEN I would be more open to further critique before dropping it into the real world. However, you must understand that the outsiders do not have the same insight as the people actually working on the logo. This board has not sat in on the meetings and discussed all the angles as to why this idea is good and why that color doesn't work for you. For that reason, the designer still gets a chance to consider (and use) or debunk (and disregard) anything said by non-participants. In the end, the actual designer's opinion still carries the most weight because that is the person you chose to design your logo - not us on the board here. Your starting point is what someone above mentioned - look at the designer's portfolio and find one you like.

These are all good points indeed.

What I'll do is just respect the work and effort of our current designers and try to get as much as I can from what I've got :)
Perhaps when we're done with the design I'll post the finished product to see how we did.
Thanks for all the advice and insight guys.

Hi, Neehoo. Welcome to the vast catfight we like to call CreativeBits. ;-)

It strikes me that you've been through two design firms with the same result. This tells me there is a serious deficiency in communication, and it probably starts with your company, the one fixed element in the story.

As Nate has pointed out with his usual clarity, your brief is just all over the map, much too vague. Nate is a musician, by the way, so he could be expected to be more clued into what you're trying to accomplish than the average designer. If he has trouble figuring out what you are/want, I don't doubt you've had difficulties with other designers.

Something that isn't in your brief at all is how you plan to use the logo. What types of publications/venues/new media will you be using? Who is the typical consumer for your company's service? You've mentioned broad (and, as Nate has pointed out, conflicting) genres of music-making , but you've said nothing about the people within those genres whom you are targeting.

If you have a problem with too many genres, maybe your design firm needs to address that creatively, by, for example, coming up with a logo that, with some small but noticeable changing element, would focus in on each genre while still expressing the idea of the umbrella company. It could be something as simple as a series of colored squares, each containing a unique mark, with the markk for your target in that ad/Web page/whatever being larger. That's a weak idea, but you get what I mean.

As to asking a designer if you can toss their work to the CreativeBits wolves (or cats...I keep getting my metaphors mixed up), I think you would be unlikely to find one who would go for that without being, at the very least, jerked out of their comfort zone. They may not even know us. If you want to do that, you might want to include it in your brief, so competing design firms can decide up front whether or not they will cooperate; if nothing else, it will give them a chance to visit the site to see what they'd be letting themselves in for. And remember, a critique might turn out to be just as much a critique of you as a "difficult" client as it will be of any designs you post. Please consider asking the designer to do the posting, though. Give them at least that much of a shot at maintaining their dignity.

Sounds to me like the problem lies with the brief. If you are not liking what the designers are working up for you then maybe you both (yourself and the designers) need to sit down and re-visit the brief. Clear communication up front about your needs are paramount and missing this point is the downfall of most projects.

As for the committee point, I agree. Design by committee rarely produces clear, workable, effective results and ends up as a watered down, nasty conglomerate of ideas.

Find the business problem you are trying to solve and sit down with the designers to clearly communicate that problem. One final point to remember; if I asked my mum to bake a cake for a friend's birthday party and the guests of that party all loved Victoria Sponge cake (in fact it was their favourite) but I hated it, would it be right to bake something different just to suit my tastes or would it be right to bake a Vicky Sponge to make my target audience feel wanted and special? Although you do need to be happy with the end result, think about what '12 Bars' needs and what your target audience like rather than what your favourite colours and styles are.