In times of trouble, a soft, fuzzy ___ is in order.

If you said "blanket" or "teddy bear" or "Donny Osmond" you'd be incorrect, I'm sorry. Once in a great while there is a mainstream article for the rest of you non-creatives that exhibits a little insight into the secret world of creativity and image promotion. We don't like to give away too much of the mystique, but share just enough so it really looks like there is a plan to all the madness.
Yesterday's New York Times had a terrific article about the latest trend in corporate logos. In times of trouble we want our soft, fuzzy, warm, reassuring and happy logo (that fills in the blank above). Logo designs have gone from CAPS LOCK, bold monstrosities that signified power, power, power, power to the soft, lower case, friendly, rounded, freshened-up cousins we see today. There are many economic and cultural reasons to make the shift to softer, sweeter, kinder logos, which I'm sure even non-creatives can guess about 5 of them. Make sure you click here to read the article and catch the full slide show of logo examples (or stop in the aha office and see the paper copy) including corporate hulks like Wal-Mart (now using the friendly sunburst, no longer the regimented star) and Kraft.

Wordsmiths Local #101 Accepting New Members

So, I pulled the ol' vehicle in for a fill-up in Bellevue, Ohio, yesterday and was greeted to another treat for language-consumed folks like myself. Maybe there is a reason why gas was SO much less expensive here. Clearly there is either a shortage of wordsmiths in marketing/signage design departments, there are no proofreaders left in this world OR there is just a shortage of people who care about language, meaning, redundancy or the like. Unfortunately, I know the answer to that one, I just may not choose to accept it yet.
I'm adding this cause to my growing list that already contains adding last names for tropical storms and saving the art of the hand-written note by purchasing, writing and sending as many note cards as I physically can. Won't you put a little pen ink and brain power to these causes for me?
As a footnote for this...I really LOVE funny business signs and I have several photos I have taken through the years of signs that have nearly caused me to get in an accident when I saw them while driving. I will find some good ones and post them for you. If you have any of your own (unaltered photos only), please send them to me at amy@aha4creative.com with a story about where they are from and I will gladly post them here!