Leigh changing their name? Bored journo doing a rumour?

[Ragingbull]

3 minutes ago, Wellsy4HullFC said:

I really hope they name the mascot Lee.

Or Derek!

Or Def.

[Dunbar]

The rebrand launch was yesterday.

Today, the Leigh website is still unavailable.

I don't care if you like the name, the brand, the shirt or whatever, this is just absolutely shocking execution from a business perspective.

[redjonn]

4 minutes ago, Martyn Sadler said:

And it's worth noting that a thread that began at 9.15am yesterday has now gone to 25 pages with 645 posts.

Whether you like the rebrand or not, it seems to be generating plenty of discussion.

The rebrand is ensuring that the club is being talked about.

Your last sentence.  

You surely don't really think that the purpose of a rebrand: "is ensuring that the club is being talked about"

That may or may not be a result but it seems that on this forum the identity aspect certainly is leaving a marketing memorable  impression.

Hopefully the "rebrand" has been tested with its target audience or community and hence had a positive impact and why they proceeded with this particular rebrand.

Personally I agree that identities often need rebrands but in this case I would have chosen a more heritage related branding. 

 

[Spidey]

15 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

People openly laughing at one of our 12 top tier teams is both good for the club in question and good for the sport.

Apparently.

It’s totally overshadowed them announcing 10 new players, and a 27 man squad for next year (if I counted correctly)

[SalfordSlim]

3 hours ago, Dave T said:

That's for awat shirts. 

Just trying to work out if it's the first letter or the last letter that's the typo here....

[Hull Kingston Bronco]

9 minutes ago, Dunbar said:

The rebrand launch was yesterday.

Today, the Leigh website is still unavailable.

I don't care if you like the name, the brand, the shirt or whatever, this is just absolutely shocking execution from a business perspective.

Exactly this, such an amateur organisation 

BREAKING: IMG have just brought their scoring timescales forwards, and announced Leigh’s today at - randomly - what seems like a press conference on Brighton beach

 

 

[SalfordSlim]

3 hours ago, RP London said:

Not sure which word you've mis-spelt there... should it be a "y" at the end instead of a "t" or a "t" at the start instead of the "a"?

Either works... 

Ah b*gger, beat me to it. Must read full thread before commenting...

[hunsletgreenandgold]

30 minutes ago, Martyn Sadler said:

It does remind me very strongly of the furore when Leeds rebranded as the Rhinos.

And look how badly that turned out.

And, before you point it out, I admit that the fundamentals of the Leeds shirt didn't change.

But until now, Leigh's cherry and white shirt has always played second fiddle to the cherry and white shirt up the road in the same borough.

Perhaps the club needs to emerge from that particular shadow.

As I've said earlier in the thread - i've no issue with the club moving in a new direction, branding wise. It's the execution that's killed it. Prime example right here - these are two huge signing for Leigh....but can you guess what most people are talking about in the comments below? It's amateur hour once again, Martyn and if you're looking for a Leeds based comparison to a rebrand that went wrong - think Leeds United's 2018 'Salute crest' and how that was widely ridiculed and mocked and ultimately had the club doing a u-turn. No good ever came of that situation. 

I've also just noticed the 'link' is to a OneDrive account and written in Word 

Edited October 21, 2022 by hunsletgreenandgold

[Chrispmartha]

29 minutes ago, Martyn Sadler said:

And it's worth noting that a thread that began at 9.15am yesterday has now gone to 25 pages with 645 posts.

Whether you like the rebrand or not, it seems to be generating plenty of discussion.

The rebrand is ensuring that the club is being talked about.

Almost exclusively in negative terms though Martyn.

 

Don't believe the all publicity is good publicity rhetoric. Leigh announced some really good stuff yesterday all over shadowed by a frankly amateurish rebrand based on nothing but Derek Beaumonts ego and love for a big cat breed.

 

That 67 page presentation was terrible and I wouldn't let that go to a client to rationalise a rebrand.

[The Ghost of 99]

One of the big things behind Hull KR and other recent team brand updates in recent years was to make the logo more digital friendly. Indeed it was being pressed quite urgently in Elstone-era Super League.

The apparent lack of interest in this aspect when creating the Calamity Kitty logo really does suggest they didn't even bother to get professional designers involved. That's amazing when you think that IMG are going to be ranking clubs on all aspects of their operations in the next 12 months. 

[Chrispmartha]

31 minutes ago, phiggins said:

I've seen enough work from branding agencies that suggest that they probably have, but then also probably put stupid deadlines on the work

If that's come from a branding agency they were either under a very low strict budget or the client had way way too much influence or both

[Chrispmartha]

43 minutes ago, Martyn Sadler said:

 

The Leigh rebrand may or may not work, but at least the club is trying to do something differently, which I think deserves our support.

Ive absolutely no problems with clubs trying to do something differently, but shoddy amateurish execution and laughable rationale do 'deserve' anything other than the ridicule it's getting.

There was absolutely no need for it to be this laughable.

[Martyn Sadler]

8 minutes ago, hunsletgreenandgold said:

As I've said earlier in the thread - i've no issue with the club moving in a new direction, branding wise. It's the execution that's killed it. Prime example right here - these are two huge signing for Leigh....but can you guess what most people are talking about in the comments below? It's amateur hour once again, Martyn and if you're looking for a Leeds based comparison to a rebrand that went wrong - think Leeds United's 2018 'Salute crest' and how that was widely ridiculed and mocked and ultimately had the club doing a u-turn. No good ever came of that situation. 

 

Of course you are right that rebrands sometimes don't work.

But the people who will make that decision are Leigh supporters, not the supporters of other clubs, and not even the members of this forum.

We probably won't find that out before next season.

[The Future is League]

2 hours ago, Chrispmartha said:

If his ego is that big that he thinks the entire RL community laughing at him is a ‘win’ he needs help

We all know he has a giant ego and he will be delighted with the column inches he is getting with the rebrand. He's got people talking about it, and for him that's a win win

[Chrispmartha]

32 minutes ago, Martyn Sadler said:

It does remind me very strongly of the furore when Leeds rebranded as the Rhinos.

And look how badly that turned out.

And, before you point it out, I admit that the fundamentals of the Leeds shirt didn't change.

But until now, Leigh's cherry and white shirt has always played second fiddle to the cherry and white shirt up the road in the same borough.

Perhaps the club needs to emerge from that particular shadow.

it was nothing like when Leeds rebranded for various reasons.

 

Leeds at the time had just been taken over and it was in an era when SL had just started and it was obvious the club needed to change.

Yes the name was a bit of a joke but they executed it far far better than this leopards effort, and also Leigh are not going from a traditional name to a 'moniker' they are going from a 'moniker' to another, because the owner likes leopards.

To compare the two is disingenuous to say the least.

And as you say one of the biggest things is Leeds didn't suddenly ditch the main branding of the club, you know the colours that they play in

[Martyn Sadler]

1 minute ago, Chrispmartha said:

Ive absolutely no problems with clubs trying to do something differently, but shoddy amateurish execution and laughable rationale do 'deserve' anything other than the ridicule it's getting.

There was absolutely no need for it to be this laughable.

I admit to having a blind spot when it comes to design in relation to logos and other elements of brand identity.

If it bombs as badly as you suggest it might, I suggest you offer your services to Derek to do a more professional job.

[SalfordSlim]

3 hours ago, Hull Kingston Bronco said:

Well, to be fair I was having some minor doubts about the Leigh Leopards, but now Martin has given it his seal of approval I'm all for it. He must have seen that slide that said "Why leopards? Degsy likes them". I certainly found that research very convincing.

 

 

 

Surely that should read "now Martin has given it his Leopard Seal of approval"?

[Martyn Sadler]

1 minute ago, Chrispmartha said:

it was nothing like when Leeds rebranded for various reasons.

 

Leeds at the time had just been taken over and it was in an era when SL had just started and it was obvious the club needed to change.

Yes the name was a bit of a joke but they executed it far far better than this leopards effort, and also Leigh are not going from a traditional name to a 'moniker' they are going from a 'moniker' to another, because the owner likes leopards.

To compare the two is disingenuous to say the least.

And as you say one of the biggest things is Leeds didn't suddenly ditch the main branding of the club, you know the colours that they play in

I disagree. I think the analogy is very strong.

In fact the opposition to what Leeds did was probably greater than the opposition to what Leigh are doing.

But it worked out well in the end as I hope it works out for Leigh.

[Chrispmartha]

9 minutes ago, The Ghost of 99 said:

One of the big things behind Hull KR and other recent team brand updates in recent years was to make the logo more digital friendly. Indeed it was being pressed quite urgently in Elstone-era Super League.

The apparent lack of interest in this aspect when creating the Calamity Kitty logo really does suggest they didn't even bother to get professional designers involved. That's amazing when you think that IMG are going to be ranking clubs on all aspects of their operations in the next 12 months. 

The Hull KR rebrand is a very good example of a great rebranding project, it was well thought out and executed brilliantly.

They spent time and money using a good branding agency.

[LeytherRob]

25 minutes ago, Spidey said:

It’s totally overshadowed them announcing 10 new players, and a 27 man squad for next year (if I counted correctly)

It is 27, however Nene MacDonald will be have to leave as we are 1 over the quota(and pretty well covered in the backline). So really we have 26 with another couple of signings needed in the pack.

[Chrispmartha]

3 minutes ago, Martyn Sadler said:

I admit to having a blind spot when it comes to design in relation to logos and other elements of brand identity.

If it bombs as badly as you suggest it might, I suggest you offer your services to Derek to do a more professional job.

Offer my services?

Is that a sarky comment?

if DB wants to come to my Branding agency to correct the shambles that he's produced, fine, but I doubt his ego would let him backtrack.

 

If you have a blind spot then listen to people who know what they are talking about, I've been in the industry for 25 years and I'm telling you this rebrand is terribly executed, wether he gets clicks on SM or not.

[Chrispmartha]

4 minutes ago, Martyn Sadler said:

I disagree. I think the analogy is very strong.

In fact the opposition to what Leeds did was probably greater than the opposition to what Leigh are doing.

But it worked out well in the end as I hope it works out for Leigh.

No it worked out well because it was actually well thought out and executed properly.

You also seem to be ignoring my point about going from a traditional name to a 'moniker' that will always be a bigger challenge than from a moniker to a moniker.

None of the good stuff they announced yesterday relied up on a switch of name and colours, and if they are going to do it do it properly not half arsed.

[Martyn Sadler]

1 minute ago, Chrispmartha said:

Offer my services?

Is that a sarky comment?

if DB wants to come to my Branding agency to correct the shambles that he's produced, fine, but I doubt his ego would let him backtrack.

 

If you have a blind spot then listen to people who know what they are talking about, I've been in the industry for 25 years and I'm telling you this rebrand is terribly executed, wether he gets clicks on SM or not.

Not sarky at all. If you are as professional as you suggest you are, then why wouldn't a Rugby League club engage you?

I'm grateful for you "telling" me, but I'll probably be more prepared to listen to you in twelve months' time when the rebranding will be shown to have flopped, as you suggest.

[Chrispmartha]

Just on Hull KR

Look at the difference between the rationale and this leopards thing

https://badge.hullkr.co.uk

 

Do the Leopards even have a working website? 

[Harry Stottle]

1 hour ago, Chrispmartha said:

No problem- and yes it’s Chris

I thought it was Martha!