New look: Club RTL

Club RTL is a Belgian commercial TV channel, launched in 1995 as the second channel from RTL-TVI, French Belgium's largest commercial broadcaster. In early March, it introduced a new on-air look, which it describes brighter and more modern. The most visible change is a series of new break bumpers that are comparatively simple logo form-ups. The channel logo remains unchanged.

A montage of the new break bumpers can be seen below.

New logo: Alpro

Alpro is a maker of soy-based food and drinks that are available in several European countries, where it is often a leader in its field. In February, it expanded into other sorts of plant-based foods by launching Almond Milk and Hazelnut Drink.

A result of this is that Alpro's logo had to be changed, as it featured a soy bean and the word "soya". The soy bean has been replaced by a rising sun behind a green leaf, and the slogan "Enjoy Plant Power" has been added. The Alpro wordmark has also gotten a new typeface.

New logo: Belfius

Dexia is a Belgian-French financial institution that got into trouble following the financial crisis. The Belgian banking operations were split off and taken over by the Belgian government. Recently, it announced that it would change its name from Dexia Bank Belgium to Belfius, and a new logo was unveiled on March 1.

The name is a combination of Belgium (Bel-), finance (-fi-) and the English word "us", summarizing the comapny's mission, which is to be a bank with local roots that listens to and learns from its costumers. The name is also easy to pronounce is many European languages. The new logo features an equal sign, to signal that the bank considers its costumers to be its equals.

The new corporate identity is credited to Hoet & Hoet and the bank's communication bureau Boondoggle.

New logo: Groen

Groen is a Belgian political party representing Green politics in Flanders. Yesterday, January 11, it unveiled a new party logo along with the the tagline Werkt voor iedereen, meaning "Works for All".

The previous logo was allegedly introduced eight years ago. It included an exclamation mark that has been removed with the new logo, as it wasn't seen as fitting a party that aims to be moderate and listening, and has established itself as a movement which is "here to stay".

And yes, it has already been pointed out that the new logo is very similar to similar to the Groupon logo.

New logo: Sporting Telenet

Earlier this year, the Belgian cable company Telenet won the rights show a lot of football. As a consequence of this major content boost, it decides to relaunch and rebrand its sports channels in a very short timeframe for a relaunch in late July.

Having previously operated under the name "Prime Sport", the sports channels would now be gathered under the banner "Sporting Telenet". The French broadcast design agency Gédéon created the on-air design, while the logo is credited to "a Flemish communications agency".

Previous Prime Sport logo.

A montage of the new on-screen graphics is available on Gédéon's website. Some selected screengrabs can be found below.

New logo: Kortrijk

Yesterday, September 28, the city of Kortrijk in West Flanders, Belgium, unveiled a new visual identity.

The design was reportedly mostly done in-house. The logo is credited to a graphic designer named Yves Debaes. The new logo reflects the changes the city has gone through in recent years. Its shape represents houses, as the city "stands like a house" (a figure of speech meaning something is solid). Red has traditionally been Kortrijk's colour and is used in the new logo as well.

With a population of 75,000, Kortrijk is one of the twenty most populated cities in Belgium.

Previous logo.

New logo: Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles

Yesterday, the government administration of the French community in Belgium unveiled a new logo as it is changing its name to Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles. The namechange from "French Community of Belgium" to "Federation Wallonia-Brussels" was announced earlier this year, causing protests from Flemish nationalists as the Belgian capital Brussels is shared between the French and Flemish communities.

The new logo consists of a stylized interpretation of the initials W and B in red, yellow and blue. The offical colours for Wallonia are yellow and red, while they are blue and yellow for Brussels. Within the logo, red and blue represents the two regions, while the yellow "hyphen" represents some sort of unity ("our solidarity and the strength of our commitment").

Previous logo.

The previous logo included a rooster, a common symbol for Wallonia.

HLN.be
Nieuwsblad.be
RTLinfo
Fédération Wallonie-Brussels logo page
Culture.be

New logo/packaging: Rama, Blue Band and Planta (Unilever margarines)

The multinational consumer products company Unilever was founded in the 1930s as a merger between a soap producer and a margarine company. Although it has expanded into other foodstuffs and hygiene products, margarine is still a central part of the company. Today, Unilever owns dozens of margarine brands around the world, most of which can be fitted into three categories: high fat/cooking, blood cholesterol lowering and low-fat.

Although there are different names in different countries, Unilever often enforces a cohesive International packaging design, where only the name changes. A few months ago, a new common design for the high-fat margarines started appearing. Created by Design Bridge in London, the new packaging features hand-drawn flowers on a sunny meadow with new typography.

The new Rama logo.

Unilever's internal name for this product category happens to be "Family Goodness", and the brand is clearly aimed at families. The brand vision is "Growing Great Kids", suggesting that Unilever wants to stress the importance of high-fat margarine for growing children.

"Our hand-drawn flowers in a sunny meadow present a deceptively simple visual identity that has grown from a strong brand strategy. The new branding talks to all parents using cross-cultural visual language and symbolism. It communicates growth and health in a universally engaging way. It conveys warm, sunny optimism and inspires trust. It is also easily applied to any packaging format and detailed brand guidelines guarantee that promotional items, literature and print conform to a unified visual identity and a common brand positioning – anywhere in the world." - Design Bridge case study

Packaging, before and after. (It seems the South-African Rama packaging has sneaked in here instead of the old German one.)

The new design has been around at least since early April, when it was covered by the German design blog Designtagebuch, and I remember seeing it in stores around then. At that point, the new look had been introduced for Rama in the German-speaking countries, Blue Band in the Netherlands and Planta in Belgium. A quick look around local Unilever websites suggests that the new design hasn't yet been introduced in any other markets.

Previous Rama logo.

Previous Blue Band logo.

Previous Planta logo.

The new look is a major shake-up for the German Rama brand, which has abandoned the "Rama girl" which has been seen on packaging for a long time, and in ads even longer. Blue Band gets to keep a tiny version of its "blue band" symbol for some reason. Planta's previous identity was part of an International generic design from 2006.

New logo: Eurostar

Eurostar is a high-speed rail service which since 1994 has connected Paris and Brussels with London.


The symbol from another angle.

Yesterday, March 29, a new identity for Eurostar was unveiled. This has been developed by the London agency SomeOne.

This is an immense corporate identity with literally hundreds of different elements.

Of course, our eyes are first turned to the new symbol, a shiny lowercase e with a line extending from it. It is in fact a three-dimensional sculpture which can be rendered with many different kinds of texture. In addition to the many metallic iterations, SomeOne have also posted eggshell and marble versions and a grass sculpture.

There are also dedicated versions of the symbol for the three travel classes, from brushed steel for "Standard" to gold for "Business Premier", and different marble textures for loyalty schemes.

Other tangible elements that have been revealed include an adapted display typeface and a series of pictograms.

SomeOne have posted lots of pages with even more information and exciting images on their web page. I've collected links to them below, its an interesting read:
One Big Idea, isn’t the big idea
Eurostar — Signature typeface
Eurostar: Iconography that’s iconic
Eurostar: Elegant loyalty schemes
Eurostar: Clearer classes of service
Eurostar: Sculpted brand thinking…
Eurostar: 100 ideas—One brilliant brand

The new look will reportedly be phased in from April 5.

The old identity dates back to the 1990s when the service was first launched. The logo included three lines, representing the three countries Eurostar travels through. The three lines also formed a stylised E for "Euro", and the rebus is finished with a yellow star.

New logo: Walibi

Walibi, an amusement park operator with activities in Belgium, France and the Netherlands, unveiled a new visual identity on January 20, 2011. It was created by Figtree Network.

Via Brand New, who has a post with more on this. More info in a post from the blog NewsParcs (archive).

Horizontal version.