On the face of it, Bank Holiday weekend must have seemed like an ideal time to sneak out a potentially divisive change to the club’s identity by Everton – sunny weather, people more likely to be outside or on weekends away, and not really going to take too much notice of any post-season announcements. The reaction to the release of their new club badge however, showed that when fans do not react well to a big change with their club they will swiftly and vociferously respond no matter the time or date.
The change to the club badge is a big and important move for any club, large or small, especially in these days of social media and wall to wall media coverage – the badge is one of the most used pieces in advertising, promotions, merchandise and press releases not to mention around the stadium and in various sections of the media and social media platforms, and of course is the centrepiece of the club’s branding to the public and it’s fan base. In Everton’s case, the new badge wasn’t a matter of a simple tweak or two but a big leap from old design to new – gone were the laurel wreaths which had featured on both sides of radically redrawn Rupert’s Tower, along with the club’s Latin motto of ‘Nil Satis Nisi Optimum’. The club cited reproduction issues in both kit production and digital media as the prime reasons for updating the club badge and took the step of putting up a multiple page presentation and an eight minute video on their website detailing the reasons and development of the new badge design.
Unfortunately, not only was the badge not well received to put it mildly, but elements of the online presentation only added fuel to the fan’s ire – specifically a mood board describing several elements of the badge as old fashioned and questioning their ‘relevance to today’, viewpoints that seemed to hugely forget the importance of traditional to football supporters and how they view their clubs, from not just to the team on the pitch but the club identity as a whole. It also raised further doubts about the claims of reproduction difficulties, given how other clubs like Newcastle have much more intricate and complicated club badges which they have stuck with, and even the England team badge, reproduced by Nike who are also Everton’s kit designer, isn’t easy design to replicate yet it had not undergone the over-simplification that Everton’s had. The team behind the design also highlighted the 1938 Theo Kelly drawing as inspiration, yet their design was further away from that rendering than the previous badge,
The online presentation also talked about how fans had been consulted about the new design, although as it turns out neither season ticket holders, shareholders or membership holders were consulted on the change at all, with the ‘consultation’ consisting of a ten fan group – hardly a representative sample of a fan base estimated by the club not too long ago to number around half a million. Following the release of the design the club’s official Twitter account was faced by a deluge of complaints throughout the evening and following day, and not even the announcement of the club appearing in a pre-season tournament in America with other big name clubs such as Real Madrid and Juventus could quell the fan’s protestations. A Twitter account against the badge was setup and gained several thousand followers in a matter of hours, whilst an online petition against the change of design proved even more popular, whilst previous plays such as Tim Cahill expressed their own disappointment at the new look.
Everton are not the first club to change their club badge of course, nor will they be the last to do so and find it an unpopular move with their fans. Spurs and Arsenal are two fellow Premier League clubs who have both redesigned their badges to varying degrees in the recent future to less than enthusiastic responses – the Arsenal redesign was taken a step further with the additional of two huge laurel wreaths either side of the badge to mark the club’s centenary season in 2011 – and in a parallel to one of the Everton fans’ complaints Spurs fans remain unhappy about the lack of their traditional Latin motto from their redesign. Lower down the leagues, 
Shrewsbury Town are another notable example of a club who have changed their badge much to the annoyance from their supporters, in this case the ire being raised by the replacement of their traditional 3 lion heads ‘loggerhead’ shield with a ‘clip art’ effort, again without motto, a change that is still being hotly disputed by their fan base in the hope of a return to something more along traditional lines.
For all the talk in Everton’s online presentation about research and consultation, the overriding opinion is that the research undertaken and process they followed is of little use if the end result is a poor design, and I have to echo the view that that 
is what Everton have ended up with. The crest itself looks curiously elongated at it’s base, the fonts used don’t have the right feel or look for the design, the club’s birthdate of 1878 seem shoe horned into the design unnecessarily and the redrawing of Ruperts Tower leaves it unfortunately looking more like a beehive or in the view of some, the Tinman’s head from the Wizard of Oz. Even amongst fellow designers and illustrators I know there hasn’t been one positive remark or endorsement of the new badge, with the overriding reaction being that the new badge is a poor reflection of the club and a sub standard effort compared to the previous design.
There is some light at the end of the tunnel for Evertonians though – two days later an official statement from the club apologised for the new badge design and for not consulting properly with the fans on the issue, and that the new design would be a one off for the 2013/2014 season only, with a new design to come into play the following year once a new badge has been decided. It is to Everton’s credit that they have responded in that manner to their fans voices, and gives hope at least to other fans that with enough pressure and a loud voice they can help to keep simple club traditions alive, as long as those in charge are prepared to listen.
The occasional design blog 