Happy Cabs: Final Logo Design

This project has taken longer than anticipated purely down to the fact the client has been so busy and has sometimes taken up to 4 days at a time to reply, however it was a pleasure producing for this and I felt positive that I was really helping as they put all their faith in my design decisions as soon as I told them what I thought would be more appropriate than what they had initially thought.

For example

• 'less industrial', yet after changes they preferred the previous design,
• 'more cartoony' which would just have been more and more a visual copy of their existing logo
• 'orange telephone numbers?' which would've been completely contradictory of the colour scheme as well as less visible on the side of the car, which is a key function. Below are some mock ups I showed them of colours I thought would work best if they really wanted them incorporated, I felt it necessary a darker shade of existing blue was most appropriate, orange they suggested really wasn't.

I liked however the concept they had in upholding a strong visual identity without having to use logotype. Incorporating the same colour as the Norwich city council sticker on the back of the car I feel this logo design in terms of colour is successful as users can visually associate this company with safety, no worries of unlicensed cabs. I think the logo fits the brief which I somewhat made for myself as they were very vague with what they wanted, so my criteria of a logo that connotes safety, reliability and is clean and contemporary is fulfilled.

So I took charge and as the designer suggested this specific design would be the most appropriate despite them requesting something more 'cartoony' and trying to add in orange numbers. After around 4 uneasy days they eventually replied. They'd originally paid me £50 upfront when I began the work and the rest £100 on completion, they stated they'd paid the rest and said they were happy with my design, the one I had fought for and gave reasoning for. (see email in previous blog)

Original logo next to new logo:

Minus the lengthly waiting time in-between replies, it was an honest pleasure making this logo for them, it was beneficial for us both as I improved my skills in Illustrator which have been incredibly basic until recently, so although that will have taken longer to get to grips with than a more skilled Illustrator user, I taught myself along the way and have been able to fight my corner in terms of insisting my designs are contextually strong. The client although not knowing what would be aesthetically the most appropriate and practical, was lovely and said they would keep in contact as I'm "part of the Happy Cabs story."

Final Logo

I thought this was very sweet and nice to be apart of a new business venture. They then added it to their website but in a J-peg format as they couldn't use the vector image for whatever reason, I offered to rectify this as it means there's a white box around it but the client didn't seem bothered about changing it, my brief was simply to make the logo however it would be nice to make it fit better on the website as a vector. Having said that it does look miles better than the original logo, the colours are fluid, design clean.
New:


Old: