New logo: Coursiers.com

Coursiers.com is described as the leading courier service company in France, operating a fleet of 200 vehicles mostly in and around Paris. This autumn it was given a new visual identity, developed by French design agency Brand Brothers.

The design process was guided by "humanity, simplification, attractiveness and devotion" and produced a new symbol with custom typography. Delivery trucks will have different clever messages on their sides that differ from vehicle to vehicle.

New logo: Canberra

Canberra is the capital of Australia, located several hundred kilometres south west of Sydney and founded in 1913. This week, the city has been given a new logo as part of a brand identity project founded by the Australian Capital Territory. The new look was created by local ad agency Coordinate, working with a PR firm called Content Group.

The new logo spells out CBR, which is the airport code for Canberra Airport. It now also stands for "Confident. Bold. Ready.", which is Canberra's new tagline. The lines inside the letter-forms are inspired by the planned city's street grid. The logo can appear both as outlines and as solid shapes.

New logo: Globecast

Globecast is a French company that assembles and transmits television and radio channels across different platforms. It is a fully owned subsidiary of Orange, formerly known as France Telecom. It adopted a new visual identity back in September.

Globecast used to use France Telecom's corporate symbol, but after the telecoms giant decided to change its name and abandon that symbol, Globecast needed its own visual identity.

New logo: Sofinco

Sofinco is a French brand for consumer credit and similar services. It is owned by CA Consumer Finance, a subsidiary of the banking group Crédit Agricole. Early this month, the brand launched a new ad campaign along with an updated logo and a new slogan, "You make commitments, and so do we" (Vous vous engagez, nous aussi, in French).

New look: Hakle

Hakle is a classic German brand of toilet paper, dating back 1928. After being owned by Kimberly-Clark for over a decade, it was sold off last year. During that time, the brand had adopted a look that was aligned with their Kleenex brand with a similar logo and packaging design. The new owners introduced a new look this month along with softer and improved paper.

Berlin-based Leo Burnett Laeufer won a pitch to design the new look. The packaging is bright and colour-coded to aid orientation. The logo-type remains mostly unchanged but now appears in white.

New logo: Disney Time

After last week's revelation of a logo for a new Disney Channel in Germany, we move over to a similar project on the other side of the planet. Specifically, Japan, where the Disney-owned entertainment channel Dlife launched a new block of children's programmes called "Disney Time" earlier this month. The branding for this block was developed by New York broadcast design agency Loyalkaspar, building on their work for the launch of Dlife last year.

The graphics package is built on different "joyful" meshes that fly around in a light blue world. Loyalkaspar were involved in everything, including name and logo development. Disney Time launched on November 2.

New logo: Sipstor

Sipstor is a new e-commerce portal from Pernod Ricard, one of the leading producers of alcoholic beverages and the owners several worldwide brands such as Absolut Vodka, Seagram and Chivas Regal. The site launched earlier this autumn, and the name and visual identity was created by Coley Porter Bell, a British design agency.

Targeting a younger audience who are particularly interested in spirits, the site specialises in limited editions from Pernod Ricard's brands.

New logo: IFM Investors

Industry Funds Management, is a fund manager that was founded in Australia in 1990 and is owned by a number of non-profit pension funds. Back in October, it changed its name to IFM Investors, respecting the company's heritage by keeping the initials but stressing the importance of its investors. The new name and identity was developed by Landor Associates.

New logo: IRB Brasil RE

Instituto de Resseguros do Brasil, marketed as IRB Brasil RE, is a Brazilian institution that offers reinsurance ("insurance for insurance companies"). Once a partly state-owned enterprise, it was recently privatised, but retains a strong position in its home market, in addition to activities in other parts of Latin America and Africa. Last month, it launched a new corporate identity, created by a Brazilian agency called Crama Design Estratégico.

The new look should communicate IRB Brasil RE's core brand values: integrated intelligence, strength, agility and flexibility. This is further emphasised by the slogan "Go beyond, to make a difference" (Ir além, para fazer a diferença). The colours are inspired by Brazil.

New logo: Rialto Channel

Rialto Channel is pay TV channel in New Zealand devoted to independent film and entertainment. Earlier this year, the channel was relaunched with a new look created by Interbrand. On-air graphics were developed by Brandspank.

The rebrand attempts open the channel up to new audiences, including those not necessarily interesting in world cinema. Interbrand had to achieve this repositioning within a tight brief, the channel wanted core elements of its logo to remain, including the typeface and the R and star combination.

New logo: Clarel

After the German drugstore giant Schlecker went bankrupt early last year, its Spanish and Portuguese branches were sold to Spanish discount supermarket chain Dia. In late it October, it was announced that the over 1,000 stores would be renamed Clarel. Schlecker stores were mainly focused on beauty, hygiene, products for kids and pets and some food, and that will stay unchanged under the new banner. The first stores carrying the new name re-opened last week.

The new brand was developed by Interbrand Madrid in a complete review of everything from communication and retail environments. Under the slogan "How do you want to shine today?" (¿Cómo quieres brillar hoy?), Clarel wants to offer products that make its costumers feel confident. The logo, with its smiling droplet, should convey brightness and clarity.

Clarity is also reflected in the range of colours, which are limited to white, black and an occasional red for promotions. A set of icons have been designed to help costumers navigate.

New logo: Disney Channel Germany

Last week, German authorities approved The Walt Disney Company's acquisition of the struggling German TV channel Das Vierte. Almost immediately, the company announced plans to close the channel down and replace it with a German version of the Disney Channel, due to launch on January 17. The new German Disney Channel will be made available for free to 93 percent of households in the country, in direct competition with three other German children's channels. It will feature Disney's original children's TV series during the day and family movies in prime time.

With the November 14 announcement came a new logo that doesn't look like the one used by Disney Channel in other countries. Absent is the well recognised profile of Mickey Mouse. It remains to be seen whether this logo is exclusive to Germany or whether it will be rolled out to other countries.

Penneys, 1963

The classic American department store chain JCPenney has had a dithering visual identity in the last few years. In October it decided to revert back to its 1971 wordmark, after introducing new logos in both 2011 and 2012. Incidentally, this month it will be exactly fifty years since the company introduced its first proper corporate identity.

Before November 1963, the stores didn't really have a consistent identity. They could be called "J. C. Penney" or "Penney's", and there were lots of different wordmarks in use. The new "signature", as it was called, was introduced as part of an extensive design programme to bring Penneys into the 1960s. The logo was described as "up-swept, modern and dynamic" and was designed to work in every form, from storefronts to the growing range of private label products. The oddly shaped P has earned it the nickname "the funky P logo".

The design programme was created by a New York firm called Peter Schladermundt Associates, lead by industrial designer Pete Schladermundt. He was once an associate of Norman Bel Geddes and quite prominent in his time, but almost forgotten today. Quite active in trademark design, he also redesigned the "Pegasus" shield for Mobil Oil in the 50s.

The timing of the logo launch proved unfortunate. The official launch was set for Sunday, November 24 when the new signature was used in advertisements around the country and several news articles about the launch were published. However, it had already been introduced in some markets a few days prior to that. In the days in between, president John F. Kennedy was assassinated.

New look: The Weather Channel

The Weather Channel is an American television network, completely dedicated to the weather that airs detailed forecasts for both national and local weather throughout the day, as well as some "weather-themed" feature programming in prime time. This week, on November 12, it launched a new brand identity, created with broadcast design agency Trollbäck + Company, ad agency Mono and sound design agency Man Made Music.

For Trollbäck, this was a project about information graphics, bringing lots of information to viewers in a clear way. In addition, there are new sets and graphics for various programmes, special graphics for severe weather, promo packaging and IDs.

New logo: Philips

Dutch consumer electronics giant Philips unveiled a redesigned version of its classic shield yesterday, November 13. This was realised by Philips' in-house design team working with several consultancies.

The company says the original shield was introduced in the 30s, but that its elements had been in use before that. The stars represented lights and the waves stood for transmissions, a reference to light bulbs and radios, the company's most recognised products at the time. It has gone through several minor alterations through the years, and in the last few decades it has played a minor role, with a wordmark acting as the primary communicator. It appears the shield will get a revival with this redesign.

The redesigned shield is part of a corporate strategy that puts emphasis on products that improve people's lives. It is summed up by the new slogan, "Innovation and You". Taking inspiration from golden ratio, the new shield is more "natural" and "human". Circles are no longer perfectly symmetrical, the waves a fewer and softer, the top has a slight curve and the entire thing is solid, which will work better in digital environments.

New logo: Mountain

Mountain is a Spanish company that has established a niche of manufacturing and configuring high-end computers and servers. It was recently given a new look by Weimark Branding, a newly established Spanish design agency.

They sought to upgrade the company's visual appearance so that it would be more in line with the quality of its products. The existing symbol, a combination of an M and a mountain, was rebuilt with triangular grid to be more robust, under the slogan "Robustness to you".

New logo: Atlantis Resources

Atlantis Resources is a company that works to commercialise tidal power, capturing the energy generated from currents through turbines located at the sea bed. It recently adopted a new visual identity, created by SomeOne in London.

The visual identity was inspired by tide maps that display streams of water with lots of arrows.

Logo round-up: October 2013

October 2013 saw a new livery for Spanish airline Iberia, a sunny heart for travel company Thomas Cook and lots of other interesting rebrands from around the world. They are gathered here in this month's logo round-up.

New logo: EMIAS

EMIAS is a new unified system for storage of medical information launched by authorities in the Russian city of Moscow. The name (ЕМИАС in Cyrillic) is an acronym of Единая медицинская информационно-аналитическая система, which roughly means "Unified Medical Information-Analysis System". It was recently given new visual identity by Art Lebedev Studio.

The wordmark is flanked by two blue dashes that should remind one of a ladder, a symbol for "upward movement and order". The logo comes in red, green and yellow versions for less formal occasions. The dashes can be separated from the logo and used for slogans and other information.

New logo: International Co-operative Alliance

The International Co-operative Alliance (ICA) is an international federation of different co-operative enterprises and organisation. If you know of a major national co-operative, that organisation is likely a member of the ICA. At this year's annual assembly in Cape Town, the organisation unveiled a new "global identity".

The previous logo had been introduced to replace a rainbow flag, to avoid confusion with similar flags.

The ICA also administers the .coop top-level domain. If you want to use new Coop marque and/or a .coop domain, you can register both on a dedicated website.

New look: Fox Life

Fox Life is TV channel brand from Fox International Channels used for several channels that air lifestyle and entertainment programming with a slight female slant. First launched in Italy in 2004, the company later rolled out Fox Life channels in several European countries and Latin America. Last spring, the original Italian channel introduced a new look with a new logo that has since been adopted by the Latin American and some European counterparts.

The new look was conceived by Argentinian motion design agency Plenty. They wanted to stress that Fox Life is about mainstream entertainment for a "coviewing" audience (i.e. a woman and her partner). The entire look uses a limited range of bright pastel colours and the motion graphics are nicely flowing and life-affirming.

Raymond Loewy 120

Raymond Loewy was born in France on November 5, 1893 and immigrated to the United States in 1919. Here he would employ himself as a fashion illustrator and window decorator, gradually gaining prominence before becoming one of the leading industrial designers in America. A highpoint of sorts was October 1949 when he was featured on the cover of Time magazine.

Being an industrial designer, Loewy designed just about everything. Locomotives, cars, interiors, gas stations, packaging and, of interest to this blog, trademarks. The Loewy brand of design would eventually travel the world when he set up a subsidiary in his native France and worked with clients in Japan.

To mark the 120th anniversary of Loewy's birth, here's a compilation of some trademarks made by his companies, Raymond Loewy Asscoiates, Loewy/Snaith and Compagnie de l'esthethique industrielle (CEI). Some of them are design classics, still used today - Shell, Formica, Spar, LU, New Man. Others are obscure and forgotten. The trademarks were often only one of many designs that Loewy created for his clients, he would often also design products or interiors to work with an overall design programme.

New logo: Sweden

Sweden is a country in northern Europe, known for ABBA, IKEA, meatballs and equality. This week, the country got a new official website which also displays a new visual identity. The new look was created by Stockholm-based design agency Söderhavet on the behalf of several government agencies.

The new minimalist identity is centred around the Swedish flag, which was identified as the most recognised and lasting symbol of the country. It is accompanied by a wordmark that spells out the Swedish name for Sweden, Sverige, is a custom-made typeface called Sweden Sans. When used outside Sweden, the local name for the country is shown above Sverige. The English version can be seen above.

MTV Finland: Sub and Ava

Yesterday, November 3, saw the launch of the company-wide rebrand for Finnish commercial broadcaster MTV, created with British broadcast design agency DixonBaxi. Today we'll take a look the full package in three posts. This third and final post is about MTV's two sister channels, Sub and Ava, that were also rebranded yesterday.

MTV Finland: MTV3

Yesterday, November 3, saw the launch of the company-wide rebrand for Finnish commercial broadcaster MTV, created with British broadcast design agency DixonBaxi. Today we'll take a look the full package in three posts. This second post on the MTV rebrand looks at the work done for the main channel, MTV3, and the company's genre brands for news and sports.

MTV Finland: Master brand

Yesterday, November 3, saw the launch of the company-wide rebrand for Finnish commercial broadcaster MTV, created with British broadcast design agency DixonBaxi. Last week I gave you an overview of the new logos, today we'll take a look the full package in three posts. This first post will be about the underlying strategy and the corporate brand.

New logo: Cembra Money Bank

Cembra Money Bank is the new name for what used to be called GE Money Bank, a Swiss subsidiary of General Electric's financial services division GE Capital. As GE are shifting their corporate strategy to be less dependent of financial services, Cembra was floated on the Zurich stock exchange this week in what is reportedly one of the largest European bank IPOs in several years. The brand strategy and identity for the new bank was created with MetaDesign in Zurich.

The name is taken from the Latin name for the Swiss pine tree, Pinus cembra.