When Anthony Precourt bought the Columbus Crew in July 2013, even he freely admitted that the club’s brand needed a massive overhaul.
But while executives looked to find a new identity that highlighted the values and aspirations of the new ownership team — and moved away from the mark that the team had used since its debut nearly 20 years prior — they also knew that it would be counterproductive to try to simply erase the history of MLS’s first official club.
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Precourt unveils the Crew’s new logo and brand onstage with the team, execs and MLS Commissioner Don Garber.
Photo by: COURTESY OF COLUMBUS CREW
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Months of research and development culminated in the massive reveal party in Columbus earlier this month, with the formal presentation of both the new logo and a new Columbus Crew SC name.
Drawing on inspirations as wide as Bundesliga logos and nautical themes found across Columbus, the rebrand aims to bridge a number of communities in the Crew’s home city but to help position the club for new strides, as well.
“Once Anthony bought the team, it was really a green light to help push things forward and really look closely at the brand and how we were being perceived in the marketplace,” said Mike Malo, senior vice president and chief marketing officer for the Crew. “With the direction we were and are going, the original crest wasn’t checking off the boxes of how we wanted to be represented.”
In the months that followed Precourt’s acquisition of the club, the Crew staff pushed on with a number of research and focus groups both internally and externally, trying to fine-tune what the club has identified as the Crew’s “brand pillars” and further deepening the team’s ties to the community.
Crew staff evaluated the efforts of other MLS teams that have recently rebranded. They also looked to soccer teams from all across Europe for inspiration, as well as to other teams playing in U.S. capital cities to see how they distinguish themselves in those respective markets.
“Through our research, we found that the teams that have had the most success in rebranding are the ones that have the strongest stories behind their identity pieces,” Malo said. “It was extremely important to us to have a
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The original logo (top) debuted with the team in 1996.
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story that means something behind our new visual identity.”
Ultimately, the resulting crest pays homage to those brand pillars the team identified through the process:
■ Original — highlighting the fact that the Crew was MLS’s first official team, had the league’s first soccer-specific stadium and brought to Columbus the city’s first pro sports championship.
■ Energetic — which looks to link the passion the fans have with the reignited passion the team has had under its new leadership.
■ Authentically Columbus — honoring both the past and the present of the city.
The new crest speaks to those elements, with its circle design paying homage both to traditional German soccer club badges in light of Columbus’ deep German heritage and the “O” in the state flag of Ohio. The inclusion of “96” is a nod to the inaugural year of play for both the club and the league.
Over the course of the rebranding, more than 100 designs were reviewed. The club ultimately whittled down that field to 13, and the final mark was selected after an executive staff retreat. The club did all of the creative elements itself, bringing in Granville, Ohio-based Whole-Brained Creative to help on identifying some of the brand elements.
Even though the rebranding was unveiled during the current MLS season, the Crew will wait until 2015 to completely flip everything over, a move Malo said has paid dividends with corporate sponsors.
“Before the brand reveal, we were able to meet with our partners and really show them the DNA and story of the new brand,” he said “We couldn’t have gotten better feedback, and all our sponsors are really excited about how we are trying to position ourselves.”
But even as the club will fully retire its inaugural crest once the 2014 season is over, Malo said it is not going to forget that part of the franchise’s history.
“Once 2015 comes, all of the old stuff will be put in a vault,” he said. “When the time is right down the road, we’ll look to see if there’s a throwback and retro desire to have it back out there.”
