Logo Design for Forward Food of America

Commonly known as Forward Food. I am also documenting the process of designing this logo on my Twitter Feed – with permission from the client.

Keywords and key phrases extracted from the brief : Tech-conscious farming, ethics, agriculture, provide food at low/no-cost, Forward Food of America commonly called Forward Food, no abbreviations, Barack Obama brand persona, hope, idealism, movement, modernists avenger, clean / sketchier / vector / text-based.

Competitors : Larger corporations like : Darigold, Dole, Chiquita. Check their logos.

Unlike competitors logos which are classic, trustworthy but outdated, @ForwardFood would like to be the “modernist’s avenger“.

Logos liked by the client alongwith keywords of why they like them :

Because it is clean, good typography & they like the colors as well.

Because of the drawing style – sketchy, colors, @ForwardFood would like a more definite form.

Because it is clever, subtle and clean.

Because this logo is fun, active, colorful, modern but a little busy.

Because of the compelling motion. But it’s more complex than @ForwardFood would aim for.

Text is the main form of the design but the client does not want too much grunge.

Balance between separation & unity with the feeling of movement, typography not so good.

Flow, color, shape.

Simple, clean, movement. Does not capture anything agrarian though.

Movement, colors, clean – vector look.

Logos not liked by the client alongwith keywords of why they did not like them :

Definitely not a look @ForwardFood wants.

Indecipherable, no immediate impact, confusing.

The client does not want cartoons in the logo.

Overdone, lacks subtlety.

Not abstract enough.

Proceeded to reference and browse through some websites for logo inspiration : Logofi.com, Logopond.com, Logofaves.com, IdentityArchives.com, IdentityWorks.com & Creattica.com. The keywords I concentrated on were food and agriculture. I abandoned the browsing after about ten minutes – information overload. Took a break, grabbed some coffee, shot some fashion-related photographs and got down to the drawing board. Thought of a ‘rake’.

First round of sketches

Will be updating with further sketches and ideas before communicating with the client, will also publish client feedback and iterations as and when they happen.

First draft of logo designs emailed to the client :

Client Feedback
Pros: We like the swirl of the wheat. It has a nice sense of movement. The color scheme is nice too.
Cons: The font type is a little too rounded. We prefer right-justified type as opposed to centered.

Client Feedback
Pros: We absolutely love the font type and color. We love the brown and green idea for the font color. “Forward Food” seems like a very “brown” phrase. We also like the right-justified type.
Cons: The “F” in the logo at first is a little hard to see at first. It seems a little busy.

Client Feedback
Pros: We love the font again. The green in “Forward Food” reminds us of fields and the wheat color in “OF AMERICA” reminds us of fall or harvesting.
Cons: The logo here is kind of the same as the second one. It’s very hard to follow and busy.

Client Feedback
Pros: We love the logo. Like the colors. Again, we’re on board with the right-justified type. Maybe we could try some other color schemes?
Cons: The placement of the text is iffy. The type-face may need to be tweaked just slightly.

Client Feedback
The feedback for this logo is basically the same as the last. The logo is something you don’t see everyday, but in a good way. We think if the text placement, typeface, and color-scheme of the overall logo are experimented with, it will be perfect.

The last two are based on the idea of the Golden Mean.

Awaiting feedback. [ Feedback received, inserted above under each image. The above is an excellent way to give feedback – talking about specifics in each logo design draft – typeface, colors, layout, placement. Better than saying, “We don’t like any of this.” which doesn’t mean much and doesn’t help in any way. ]

Second draft of logo designs emailed to the client : edits based on feedback.