Volvo Rebranding
The Swedish motor vehicle manufacturer has appointed branding agency Bite to develop its logo as part of a plan to elevate the marque’s iron symbol to give it the same level of prominence as the Volvo mark.
The changes, which are the brand’s most significant in 75 years, are intended to eradicate inconsistencies in the application of the Volvo identity across its models and communications.
The company also wants to make greater use of the iron symbol, which it claims is recognised as a good illustration of the strength and endurance of its vehicles.
The reworked logo will first appear on the C30 model, which is due to be launched at the Paris Motor Show in September, and international promotional material for the model. Volvo hopes the C30 will rid it of its traditional association as a safe choice of family car and make it appeal to a younger and broader audience.
Found at: Design Bulletin.
Posted in Branding 
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March 11th, 2006 at 10:35 pm
is this a joke?
March 12th, 2006 at 3:07 am
volvo
100% male.
March 12th, 2006 at 1:22 pm
I think its a move in the wrong direction. Seems like a good way to effectively cut your potential buyers in half.
For a car that prouds itself on safety (a trait that women prob care more about) this doesn’t make any sense.
we’ll see how it turns out.
March 12th, 2006 at 9:09 pm
Okay, so they aim to gain 18-25 year old red-blooded males and alienate anyone not driven by testosterone. Good job they build safe cars given the driving record of that demographic.
tch.
March 12th, 2006 at 11:09 pm
[...] When I read this story about the re-branding of the Volvo logo, my nostrils flared and I screamed out a vulgarity that’s probably best not repeated, even on the Internet. Volvo hopes the C30 will rid it of its traditional association as a safe choice of family car and make it appeal to a younger and broader audience. [...]
March 12th, 2006 at 11:17 pm
[...] When I read this story about the re-branding of the Volvo logo, my nostrils flared and I screamed out a vulgarity that’s probably best not repeated, even on the Internet. Volvo hopes the C30 will rid it of its traditional association as a safe choice of family car and make it appeal to a younger and broader audience. [...]
March 13th, 2006 at 7:55 am
its like 80 yrs old:
http://images.google.com/images?q=volvo+logo
March 13th, 2006 at 10:32 am
That’s so nuts I find it hard to believe it’s real. What a bad move.
March 13th, 2006 at 11:13 am
The idea of making things consistent makes sense, although I never understood why Volvo used the “male” symbol for a logo.
I realize the Volvo wants to incorporate the “iron” symbol into the logo, but using gradients to make it look 3d, while faithfully following the current “make it look like a dock icon” trend, feels thin.
I wouldn’t be surprized if this looks dated in 5-10 years, if that.
Same goes for AT&T, UPS, et cetera.
March 16th, 2006 at 5:42 am
wrong, totally wrong, why everybody thinks it’s time to change the logo? it moves the whole branding, which is established and pretty good, in a negative direction. it will blend in with all the others, instead of standing out.
love the old one.
April 19th, 2006 at 5:12 pm
wow this looks like a testosterone loaded brand now! how frightening for volvo’s once upon a time image of the family car…
May 23rd, 2006 at 6:18 am
Symbols:
A common symbol used to represent the female gender is ♀ (Unicode: U+2640), a circle with a small cross underneath. This symbol also represents the planet Venus and is a stylized representation of the goddess Venus’ hand mirror.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female
May 23rd, 2006 at 6:33 am
SYMBOLS
The Mars symbol (♂) may refer to:
In biology, the male sex
In mythology, the Roman god Mars or the Greek god Ares
In astronomy, the planet Mars
In alchemy, iron
In old manuscripts, the Mars symbol was drawn as a Venus symbol rotated 135 degrees. So it originally had a cross instead of the arrow. Alchemists constructed the symbol from a cross (representing matter) above a circle (representing spirit).The new Mars symbol is sometimes interpreted as the spear and shield from the war god Mars/Ares.
This is used as Austin Powers’ logo in the Austin Powers movies.
See also: Venus symbol and Gender symbol
May 23rd, 2006 at 6:35 am
I believe VOLVO uses the symbol with reference to Austin Powers and the comedy associated with it and not referencing the male sex.
(If they are refering to the male sex please notice how small the arrow is.)
=)