Landor’s latest for a financial company is a re-worked logo. Fiserve’s Chief Executive Jeffery Yabuki, performs the squawk of shame for the Journal Sentinel:

The new logo, which is the word fiserv. – with a period – is orange because it’s different from the common industry logo color of blue and “has a certain heat and energy to it, but not the kind of danger you perceive when you see red,” Yabuki said.

No red menace here.

Red bad. Red is color of Danger. Danger bad for financial company image.

Unless of course you can sell it to another financial client. From the bowels of the Landor site:

Landor created an identity and retail space for HSBC Direct. The use of white communicates the simplicity of the brand, while red projects a contemporary attitude.

Don't be alarmed, it's just HSBC Direct's Landorian luminosity.

Full Case study

Landor founder, Walter Landor gazing inappropriately at his half-son, Blandor.

Says Blandor the Imponderable: “I fondly recall Poppy and I attending the semi-annual wisdom tooth convention. As we sat on our haunches, grooming each other and eating our sack lunch of turkey biscotti and marshmallow toast, we would randomly jump up and shout, “Wottle up the bull throttle!”. We would then travel the 3 hours home, in complete silence, until our arrival at Mandible Station.”

More on the misspent journey of Blandor’s life.

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America Is F*cked…….(Graphically at least) from Jess Gibson on Vimeo.

Next time, maybe they could do a simple competitive analysis. If they had, they may have realized the lack of power the name “Brand Union” has, even within this small sample of their competitors:

Brand-DNA, Brand A, Brand 2.0, Brand Channel, Brand Design, Brand Doctors, Brand Evolve, Brand Evolution, Brand Fidelity, Brand Forward, Brand Institute, Brand Juice, Brand Ladder, Brand Link, Brand Maverick, Brand Mechanics, Brand Meta, Brand People, Brand Positioning, Brand Salt, Brandscape, Brand Scope, Brand Sequence, Brand Slinger, Brand Solutions, Brand Spark, Brand Vista, CoreBrand, Future Brand, Independent Branding, Interbrand, Not Just Any Branding, The Better Branding Company, The Brand Company, The Brand Consultancy, Trading Brands.

Ignorance is a bitch.

If your company or product is in need of a truly shitty “world class name and identity”, you now know where to go.

Or you could get one on sale at Grand Union.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Forth & Towne is a brand of clothing stores that is owned by Gap Inc., which also owns the Gap, Banana Republic, and Old Navy brands. Forth & Towne focuses on women over 35 who grew up with the Gap brand, but have “lost touch” with it.

History

The brand was announced by Gap Inc. in September 2004, and has a planned launch date sometime in Autumn 2005. At that point, Gap Inc. will begin a test phase of the new concept with four stores in the Chicago area, and one in New York . If successful, the company plans to add at least 50 additional stores in the United Kingdom, France, and Japan by the year 2007.

History??? What kind of header is that? It’s not even open yet, just a store that Gap plans on opening and it merits an entry in an encyclopedia? Not in one that wants to maintain its hard-won credibility.

Lest you think the Book of Revelation reference too heavy-handed, check out the number of search results returned here. There are no coincidences.

After nearly four months of research and thousands of options, American Express Financial Advisers on Wednesday plans to unveil a new corporate name to its employees and independent advisers.

Company officials are keeping the moniker close to the vest, but they say it won’t include the three letters “IDS,” which stand for Investors Diversified Services, the regionally famous name of American Express Financial’s predecessor company.

“I feel the name that we landed on really conveys the attributes that we will be advertising and talking about as we build the company,” Chief Marketing Officer Kim Sharan said Monday in an interview….

…The name search included American Express Financial’s 18,000 employees and financial advisers nationwide and the New York branding agency of Lippincott Mercer. Forty percent of employees and advisers participated in an online survey to determine what characteristics they most associated with the company, Sharan said.

“There has been such buzz about this place shortly after the spinoff was announced,” said David Kanihan, a spokesman for American Express Financial Advisors. “The name is something people can really latch onto.”

The company determined its name should reflect these characteristics: personal and approachable, authentic, pro-active, creative, knowledgeable and vast, Sharan said.

Amex won’t say what the new name is, but we can give you a peek. Between April 11-13 of this year they filed the following trademarks under “financial services”:

Archetype
Amplify
Amworth
Ameriprise
Luminous
Oakbridge
Sageborne
Sagemont
Riversource
Tiller

Filing multiple marks at the end of a naming process is a typical procedure, giving American Express multiple options during the global vetting process. So which of these names will be THE name?

We’re going to guess that it will be Ameriprise, though we hope it won’t be. Anyone else?

UPDATE 5/25: Don’t say we didn’t warn you. In a quick change of course, American Express went from being secretive about the new name yesterday to announcing it today. As predicted, they went with Ameriprise, because despite the spin, it was the easiest name to sell internally. How can we tell? From the Star Tribune:

“The name Ameriprise reflects both our history and our strengths as one of the leading financial services firms in the United States,” said Jim Cracchiolo, chairman and CEO of Financial Advisors said in a statement. “The name represents our American roots and the vastness of our nationwide network of over 10,500 financial advisors. It also embodies the enterprising culture our people bring to bear in helping provide our clients the peace of mind that comes with planning for a secure financial future.”

Compare the rationale above with the name attributes they were looking for, as announced yesterday:

The company determined its name should reflect these characteristics: personal and approachable, authentic, pro-active, creative, knowledgeable and vast, Sharan said.

Well, “vast” made the cut anyway. But in order to help push the pedestrian, internally-focused name in a bold and exciting direction, the logo team has devised a revolutionary visual concept for a financial service company. Hold onto your hats:

The Ameriprise Financial logo is based on a compass, designed to symbolize how the company helps its clients navigate toward their financial futures.

Just when you think you’ve seen it all before….