What does 'Save the Children' do?

The British design group Johnson Banks have been working on an interesting project for Save the Children.

The basic problem faced by the client was that, despite the name, no one really knows what they do. Added to that, their corporate identity is a little, er, dull, and their corporate guidelines are quite strict about the use of Gill Sans as their typeface. (Guidelines do that - that's the whole point - but the problem here is that they maybe take 'corporate' too far, and make the charity appear less than friendly).

The idea they came up with was to give outlines of the font, in several weights, to children to get them to fill them in. Then the best were chosen, digitised, and are now being used in Save the Children publicity - the guidelines are adhered to, but with a little creativity they also manage to make Save the Children a little bit more childlike without being childish.

Here are some images from the project. You can see the whole story at Johnson Banks's blog (which is worth subscribing to). Of note is the fact that they had to get permission from Monotype, who 'own' Gill Sans, to treat the typeface in this way.

Chewing Gum Wars

From the BBC's Money Programme site comes this article about the chewing gum market, and the recent entry in to the UK of Cadbury's new 'Trident' Brand.

NB The programme on which this article is based was broadcast on BBC2 on Friday 25 May 2007.

See also 'Big Gum Battle' and 'Gum campaign branded racist'.

Chewing gum is at the centre of a retail battle between Wrigley, the dominant player in Britain for decades, and Cadbury, the world's biggest confectionary company. At stake is the £250m a year the British spend on gum.

Cadbury launched four Trident products in Britain in February. They appeared on newsagents shelves alongside the 32 gum products sold by Wrigley.

Cadbury's campaign hit the headlines two months later when the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) banned its TV advertisement for Trident featuring a "dub poet" enthusing about Trident on stage in a nightclub.

The ASA received more than 500 complaints that the ad was racist in its stereotyping of the over-excited, Jamaican-style character.



Now Cadbury Trebor Bassett's managing director, Simon Baldry, tells the Money Programme that he wants to apologise for the advert.

"It was never our intention to offend anyone," he says.

"If we have offended people then clearly we would like to apologise for that."

But he denies the campaign was intended to stir up controversy.

"Let me be very clear, controversy was never part of launching this brand. Many consumers love this ad and it's been a great vehicle for us to communicate to the nation about a great new gum experience."

Fun race

Five years ago, Cadbury bought into gum with its purchase of Adams, an American gum company, which, like Wrigley, has its roots in the 19th Century.

Adams products, such as Trident, Dentyne and Certs, were big sellers in the US and elsewhere, but were not sold in Britain.

The attraction of Adams for Cadbury was that gum sales are growing at three times the rate of chocolate, a Cadbury staple.


Changing tastes key to gum war

But the UK was a market out of step with global growth.

"Britain had been chewing below its weight," says Cadbury's Director of Global Gum, Jim Cali. Here, gum sales had actually fallen by 4% in the past two years.

Wrigley says it anticipated Cadbury's move into its territory. "We've been expecting it for a number of years, since they've been buying gum companies around the world," says Gharry Eccles, managing director of Wrigley UK.

And Mr Eccles says he would relish the prospect of increased competition.

"If you're running a race, running it on your own is actually no fun," he says.

"When you're running against someone it becomes a whole new ball game, and a lot more fun."

Pleasure and indulgence

Cadbury does not appear to have been harmed by its controversial campaign.

According to the latest market figures from AC Neilsen, Trident is taking a 12.5% share of the market, leaving Wrigley with a still-dominant 86.3%.


The good news for both companies is that the £12m total gum market is up almost 20% on this time last year and Wrigley itself has grown its sales by 5%, with new products such as Orbit Complete.

Both companies have been seeking to differentiate themselves.

Cadbury wants to stress how it is bringing its confectionary experience to the chewing gum business.

"Pleasure and indulgence is what we know best," declares Mr Baldry.

"It's our expertise in our total confectionary field, and we're bringing that to the gum category too."

Agrees Mr Cali: "Gum is fun."

Health benefits?

Wrigley is anxious not to be painted as the functional alternative to the indulgence of Cadbury, but nevertheless has set up a research programme under the title The Wrigley Science Institute.

Based in Chicago, its head, Gilbert Leveille, sponsors research at universities around the world, looking for health benefits of chewing gum.

So far, they have established that gum can help reduce tooth decay, but have yet to confirm some of the newer claims, such as that chewing during learning can improve memory.

Mr Leveille is hopeful, explaining that "chewing gum increases blood flow to the brain very significantly, and that could be a plausible explanation for why some of these mental benefits seem to be associated with chewing gum".

The irony is that Trident, whose name in Britain today reminds people of missiles rather than mastication, was originally named in the 1960's because it contained three ingredients that were supposed to be good for your teeth - hence "tri-dent".

Fighting litter

For all the competition between the two companies, on the question of chewing gum litter, Wrigley and Cadbury are united.

Both companies want to keep regulation at bay and are cooperating with a government initiative to control litter.

Under the auspices of Defra (The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), the companies are represented on the so-called Chewing Gum Action Group.

The Group, with a budget of £600,000 provided by the manufacturers, helps local authorities publicise anti-gum litter messages.

Defra minister Ben Bradshaw is responsible for dealing with the litter problem, and says his department has been "working very closely with the chewing gum manufacturers".

Mr Bradshaw accepts the manufacturers' argument that the problem lies with consumers, rather than being the direct responsibility of chewing gum makers.

"We don't want to penalise a legal product that the public enjoy, but we want to try and change people's behaviour when they use that product," he says.

But anti-gum campaigners such as Westminster Councillor Alan Bradley, are unimpressed, describing the Defra group as "dancing to the manufacturers' tune".

He points to a similar group in Ireland that has a higher budget per capita, and will be active in all local authorities, rather than in just the 15 a year in the UK that the Defra group is targeting.

There is no sign of a limit to the global consumption of gum. Indeed, Wrigley's sales worldwide are up by almost 30% in its latest figures.

When William Wrigley settled on gum as the way to make his fortune in Chicago at the end of the 19th Century, he had no idea that the brands he created - Juicy Fruit, Spearmint and Doublemint - would still be growing, more than a century later.

Worst idea ever: UK school does away with playgrounds

It doesn't take much to get me in rant mode these days—not sure why that is, I'm normally all sweetness and light.
But here's a story that has really got me seething. It turns out that a new school, Thomas Deacon Academy in the UK has been built... without a playground.

That's right. There is nowhere for kids to run around, socialise, have their first snog, and illicit cigarette, practice their football skills, bully or be bullied. (Well the last two don't make my case but anyway).

The head of the school says "This is a massive investment of public money and I think what the public want is maximum learning. They recognise that youngsters can play in their own time, play in their local communities. What I want from my teachers is maximum teaching and I want maximum learning from the youngsters."

You don't get that from stopping them playing and socialising. The school calls it 'university style' teaching and learning. Well, I don't think I've ever come across anything like that in my experience of universities. Visit the school's website and read the list of 'facilities'. It sounds like the Panopticon, with no privacy for anyone, students or teachers. I bet you the first thing that happens is the wonderful glass walls will get covered up with work to let people get on with learning without being stared at by passers by (although come to think of it, when would anyone be passing by to look at classes taking place? Won't they all be in class at the same time?)

This is a stupid idea and whoever dreamt it up should be strung up, along with whoever allowed them to get away with it.
There are two main reasons why I think this is idiotic:

Firstly, there is a clear link between play and creativity, and creativity is key to good, deep learning. You might be able to learn how to manipulate numbers in a maths lesson, but you need to be really creative to get them to do amazing things like predicting what will happen when a rocket takes off at a certain time, velocity and direction—will it reach Saturn or will it burn up in the Sun? Well who cares with that, so long as you pass your exams and make the school look good.

Secondly, has no one told these people about childhood obesity? When are these kids going to get any exercise? What are they going to do between classes? When are they going to burn off excess energy? How are teachers going to cope with kids who have been made to sit with their heads in books or in front of computer screens all day?

I can think of lots more reasons too. I bet you no great artists, musicians or designers will come out of this school, and I'd be surprised if there were any great engineers, writers, politicians, teachers, aid workers, or medics either. And that's despite the wonderful-looking photos on the website. You can have all the 'interactive plasma screens' in the world, but they don't guarantee anyone's going to learn anything.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Here's the story. Worth reading and spitting your cornflakes all over the floor.

Incidentally, the school's website has a wonderful artist's impression with loads of kids sitting outside on the grass... next to a motorway by the looks of things. Looks like even the illustrated fake kids don't want to go in to a school without a playground.

More designer bullshit

Design Week has a brief article (their articles are rarely long, seeing as how the entire magazine appears to be made up of gloating press releases from various companies puffing about something insubstantial, and very little actual analysis) about the long-awaited (like 25 years) rebranding of Morrisons supermarket.

Now even though I'm sort of anti-supermarket ('sort of' as in I am currently forced to use them but would gladly not if I had the choice - as someone said on TV last night, the coming Scottish parliamentary elections are pretty much moot as Tesco basically own the whole country) I do have a soft spot for Morrisons, it being the Yorkshire supermarket I grew up with and that for a long time was our smug regional secret.

Their old logo, though, was a bit oppressive. It looks more like a construction firm than a family-run supermarket:



And here's the new one:



Well, it's okay. I like it. Keeps a link with the old version while looking much more friendly. I'm not sure what else you can really do, to be honest.

But here's an example of the sort of designer bullshit that I reckon is more to blame for clients dismissing designers and refusing to pay good money for the job than the usual culprit, the PC and cheap software:

Peter Knapp, creative director at design firm Landor Associates, says: 'We used yellow in a very dramatic way. It is a colour that Morrisons has ownership of. Lots of people are trading heavily for green, but yellow is relevant. It signifies brightness and freshness’

What exactly is 'dramatic' about a yellow circle? It's a yellow circle, for crying out loud. It was in the old logo too. It's not dramatic, it's just familiar. And 'Lots of people are trading heavily for green' - what does that mean?
You could have said something less arty, like 'it suggests the sun' or something but no, you have to say something that will make most people say 'Dramatic? I could have done that' and then laugh at whatever was charged.

Seriously, we need to stop talking gibberish when it comes to design. It's a nice, clean and bright logo, but it sure ain't 'dramatic'. War footage is dramatic, Bush resigning would be dramatic, Shakespeare is dramatic but this... it's just a logo.

Limiting creativity

Here's a question I often ponder, and one that's come up again recently as I mark student essays that ask them to examine the influences on their tastes, and why they are now studying design (graphic, textile, interior, product, and jewellery).
The thing that's common among them all is 'an interest in art', which is odd, considering that design is not art. It looks similar, it uses similar materials and techniques but it is certainly not the same.

So why don't students who study, say, maths or physics or history go on to study design?

Why is an interest in art seen as a prerequisite for an interest in design? Are we not limiting ourselves by only seeking students who take the art route at school and, in doing so, sending out the signal that other subjects are not important?
In product design, might an interest and knowledge in maths or physics be as important, if not more so, than the ability to paint a stuffed rabbit? So why is it the interview process for design usually uses the portfolio as the first, if not the only, filter to the course?

There's no demonstrable link between artistic ability or temperament and design ability, so why impose one on 16-17 year olds (and younger, given that choices of specialism are made at 13-14)?

It would be interesting to see what would happen if we started saying to school kids 'if you want to study design there is no need to do art - do history, English, maths, physics or anything'. I have a feeling we might find design leaping ahead if we widened the gene pool instead of narrowing it, and in the process putting up blocks to those kids who may be the greatest designers who walked the face of the earth, but had the misfortune to go to a school where the art teaching was crap. It shouldn't matter.

Shame it'll never happen though. Designers like to pretend they're artists, and adopt the cultural swagger that goes with it. Maybe that's the 'use' of art as a subject for design students - that's all it does: lets you walk the walk and talk the talk. But it certainly isn't a guarantee of design ability.

Amazon Apollo plugin

Quick test of the new Adobe Apollo software...



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Comics Conference

This conference on May 25-26 might interest comic fans and academics - seems like it will have something for everyone (including a stall!)

"Biff! Bam!! Crikey!!!: Comics as Design and Entertainment" represents an opportunity for Dundee to celebrate its long history at the forefront of comics production in Britain. Leading comics historians Paul Gravett and Roger Sabin will present talks on the origins and importance of comics in Britain, while other talks will explore the contribution of DC Thomson, the work of contemporary British comics writers and artists, and the interactions between comics and other media (film, computer games, etc). Other presentations will tackle political issues in comics, as well as the role of comics as design and entertainment.

These lively and entertaining talks, spread over two days, are open to all, young and old, and entry is free.

Dundee is the perfect venue for this conference as the comics of Dundee based publisher DC Thomson are known all over the world, and 2007 marks the 70th anniversary of The Dandy, widely recognised as the world's longest running comic. The conference is part of the Six Cities Design Festival, funded by the Scottish Executive.

http://www.dundee.ac.uk/english/news/2007/biffbam.htm

Just say no

IMG_0862.JPG, originally uploaded by artistry.

Matt, my ex-student, is now art director of 'Disorder', a music magazine (if you can call that music, I mean...)

Anyway, unbeknownst to me, the mag had recently featured a club night, Neon Nights, organised by a current student of mine up here in Scotland (it's a small world), and Matt, knowing he was coming up to stay with me for the weekend, got us on the guest list to take some pics for the 'street style' section.

So, several years after my last clubbing experience, off we trotted to the Reading Rooms, a weird, rather beautiful building in Dundee's east docks area that has been transformed into a seedy den of iniquity in true authentic style.
There was a large queue of people outside but we sauntered straight to the front and got in without waiting or paying, which made me feel rather special.

Inside I became the designated photographer (as it was my camera) and we pitched up in the corner opposite the bar, trying to attract the strangely-dressed to come and be snapped for the mag.
The evening got really odd. I have a short video from my phone in which I can be heard accepting the offer of a drink from Matt and saying 'last one'. That, if I remember, was around midnight. We got home at about 4.30am...

This is one of my favourite shots of the evening. I have another version without the flash obscuring the letters but as Matt has first usage rights I thought I'd post this one instead. The dress says "Fuck off I don't sell E's" (I'll tell her when I see her that Es is not a possessive and does not require an apostrophe, but I was off duty at the time).

Anyway, it's a charming message and one we should support. Clearly 'just say no' has had its day and no longer works the way it did in Nancy Reagan's day.
Actually there's a thought - this girl may well be Prime Minister one day, so I'll hang on to this pic just in case...

Oh, and yes, we danced like idiots. Hopefully there's no video of that