Controversy surrounds the Auckland Council’s logo competition. At its heart lies the endless debate around speculative, or ‘spec’, work. Personally, my choice is not to participate in these, although unlike most designers, I’m prepared to admit that occasionally my hand is forced by not actually having a great idea.

Most designers are too insecure to admit that. They’d  have you believe that we can always create great concepts for anything because it’s our job, but a cursory glance at the logos of the world’s best-known companies confirms this to be at worst, a fallacy, and at best, wishful thinking.

Admittedly, many of these concepts may have been hamstrung by a poor designer, marketing department or board. What is true is that designers, through a combination of talent, training and experience, are generally better than other people at coming up with strong visual ideas on demand. They just don’t have exclusive rights to them.

This is something that designers don’t want you to think, but is something which our own fanatically coveted design history confirms. Everyone knows, and has used a version of, the best and most-cited example of a non-designer creating a global design standard, being engineering draughtsman Harry Beck’s London Underground map.

Before we get swept away by this stirring underdog tale however, let’s not forget that for every Harry Beck there are thousands of computer literate enthusiasts busily creating visual atrocities every day. Some of the public entries for the unofficial Brand for London contest demonstrate precisely how much the quality of work can vary.

The trouble with logos

It isn’t easy to encapsulate an organisation or location within a unique visual identity scheme, and then condense that into a concise visual flourish that usually constitutes a great logo. Sometimes the idea takes ages to arrive, and depending on the designer’s ability, the nature of the subject and the stakeholders, more often than not it’s laden with compromise.

If you are developing a visual identity in the full glare of the media spotlight, you and your client will then have to run the gauntlet of the now traditional public logo beat-up whipped up by the media. This generally follows a set order of events:

Vast numbers of man-hours spent in consultations and iterations of your entire brand are swept aside unmentioned as the logo alone is served up to the public. Cruelly isolated in its dowdiest incarnation, against a white background, it is bereft of the protection of the complete visual identity. To add insult to injury, it will always be accompanied by the now seemingly exorbitant price tag.

If you’ve been foolish enough to write anything remotely fluffy in your accompanying press release, that passage will also be surgically extracted to complete the article, but that you probably deserve.

Once published, the public and your industry peers howl with derision. The unit of time that it takes for one of the plebs to post the achingly hackneyed comment ‘my five year-old could have done better than that’ on the Herald’s Your Views section is now scientifically acknowledged to be the smallest measurable: the twatosecond.

Given these challenges and the fact that a strong visual identity will convey numerous benefits to our clients, including competitive advantage, it’s no wonder that designers expect to be well paid for this particular aspect of their job.

The trouble with designers

The reaction of the Designers Institute of New Zealand to the latest contest has been understandably disapproving. It’s widely accepted that design contests and upaid pitches devalue design, and this brief contains no real objectives other than to create the logo itself. Such a logo is unlikely to be successfully developed or well-received outside the context of a complete visual identity, and what’s more, it is expected to approach the genius of Milton Glaser’s I Love New York design or the London Transport roundel.

The terms, prizes and judging process may be slightly ambiguous, but the panel of judges are far better than we could normally expect. While some have lamented the absence of a practising designer on the panel, any spineless, visually illiterate bureaucrats are also refreshingly absent. The panel have been forthright about the high standard they require in order to declare a winner.

Nevertheless, those opposing this competition would usually be entirely correct to do so, but should they?

Firstly, the public, including design students and school kids, are already involved, and it seems elitist and generally mean-spirited of the design profession to dismiss their total participation.

In addition, the ratepayer is footing the bill, the endeavour is arguably pro bono publico and the last two major public rebrands, the previous Auckland Council logo and Telecom NZ, have attracted considerable public derision.

As a result, the design profession’s stock is somewhat low, and reconsidering its total opposition to public contests is now very much in order.

What’s the worst that could happen?

Given everyone’s expectations, it’s quite possible that the contest ends in failure. The process will be suitably discredited, and the profession might have an opportunity to redeem itself through its preferred processes instead. This is the route that London has taken, having struggled to declare a reputable branding agency to be the winner of its lengthy and controversial unpaid public tender.

The profession can also vindicate itself because, in the unlikely event of anyone actually winning, that person is likely to be a professional designer. We must give them our full support during the inevitable media onslaught. Even though this may encourage further contests, the profession will be in a much stronger position to oppose them.

What is important is that the contest can be used to educate the public now that they are already engaged. Regardless of whether it succeeds or fails, one would hope that a cross-section of the entries will be presented to justify the judges’ decision and probably vindicate the design profession, especially if one of us wins.

Should you enter?

I have a suspicion that many of the more vocal opponents of the contest either don’t have a great idea, represent big, greedy agencies or simply don’t care about Auckland because they don’t live here. Entering this contest is a personal decision, and if you are a professional designer, and aren’t conflicted in some way about it, you should be.

Simply put, if you have a great idea, I think you should enter. If it’s good enough to win and make the contest a success, that will really annoy Wellingtonians, and everyone in Auckland can support that.

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