My first thought is that making the icon male may not be a good idea. I'd avoid identifying a company with a particular gender unless there was a very good reason to do so.

Or is this maybe a one-person company and the icon represents you and the way you dress?

It is really important to put a lot of thought into what exactly you want to communicate. This makes me think of secret agents of the government like the movie 'Men in Black'. The tippy toes almost says ballet or floating. It feels like a 1940's idea of what business is, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if your clients are more interested in a more cutting edge approach. The name says entourage, but there is only one guy - this is a little confusing. The name almost suggests that you will get a bunch of people working on your business.

As for the look, the leading could use a lot of work. Too tight for me. Also consider how this reproduces at 1cm x 1cm. I think you will find that many of the small details are lost.

Forget the green, worry about colour later. Do it in B&W for now.

Increase inter-letter spacing of “CONSULTING” to fill horizontal space.

Eliminate inter-letter spacing of “the business renovators” and increase type size to match width of “entourage.”

Then work on vertical spacing.

Then start colour selection.

And remove all gender references. Potential for miscommunication too risky.

Finalize type first, then think about mark.

Thanks for all the comments! There's some really good points that have been raised that I hadn't thought. I now see that the current logo I posted may cause too much confusion.

I've attached some other designs that I had done up. What are some opinions on these and what stands out to you?

The type is cramped. Work on some layouts that give it room to breath.

I'm also not a fan of the suited person. It doesn't really say anything about your business (other than you maybe wear wing tips? ;)

The other designs are all rather generic and don't add much.

I'd really just focus on your type for now. Get that right first. Then see if you even need a mark to go with it.

Ok I'll just focus on the type of the moment. Do you have any recommendations?

I'd agree that the type seems cramped (both the letter spacing and the space between lines). To me the lower case versions are more interesting visually.

As for the mark, frankly I'm not sure you even need one; a nice type treatment might be enough. But to comment on the ones you're showing, for 1-2 if you're going to show a bar graph, show it going up, not down (because you're improving their business). 3-4 seem too abstract. 5-6 an icon of people could definitely be a direction to explore, but it's also a symbol that's overused and neither of the treatments you show seem very interesting to me. 7-10 a stylized "e" is certainly a possibility, but none of those seem very interesting to me. Like I said, try some typographic solutions and you may find that's all you need.

Your tag line (the business renovators) is tiny; it'll be hard to read when the logo is small.

Shane, I think you have some good ideas floating around, but to be brutally honest: you're probably good at your consulting business - hire somebody who's good at designing logos... :-/ Of course he will need to listen to your ideas to do a good job of it - that's basically your main role in the design of your logo. Unless you see this as a way of learning how to become a graphic designer, mostly to me you're wasting time compromising the visual effectiveness of your identity.

That said, one thing Typophile can help you with is finding some fonts that convey ideas that mesh with your business. Plus critique the work of a professional graphic designer, in order to identity problems or refine things a bit. But really, that's about it.

hhp

I’m totally with hrant on this one. Give a designer money in exchange for their knowledge, training, skills, and experience. The same way you intend clients to approach you. This sort of “self surgery” is an inefficient consumption of your resources. Hire a professional who can produce greater quality in less time, and redirect the energy you would spend trying to do it yourself back into your business. In the collective time we have spent talking, your business cards would be in your wallet.

That said, I think you’re moving farther away from a solution and over complicating things. Ignore all marks entirely. Ignore colour. Only focus on the type in black and white. You might not even need a mark after the type is sorted.

I strongly recommend you take the “pay a professional” route though. People here are capable of doing in seconds what you would not ever be able to accomplish alone. Such as my father prescribing medication. Trust me. There are highly specialized professionals here. Some of the best in the world. You can contact anyone of them directly by clicking on their name.

Hi guys, Thanks for the feedback, I really appreciate it. While I've always dabbled in design and like to do little bit on the side, I'm by no means an expert, especially when it comes to types and logo design.

I completely agree about having a professional do the design, it's just I've hit boiling point with frustration trying to get designers to get this logo right. In the past I've been able to have high-end designers or creative agencies work on logo concepts but I'm in a different position this time. Against my better judgement I thought I would get a cheaper designer to come up with concepts but as you've seen, they are less than acceptable.

This seems a great forum with some real experts on type and logo design so I was hoping I could get some advice on a good type I could use for a short term logo so I can at least get my website live. Then when I have a bigger budget I can get a professional to do the logo and other design work I require.

Just out of curiosity, what ballpark price do you guys charge for logo design?

“…what ballpark price do you guys charge for logo design?”

That will vary depending on the designer and deliverable. I would not expect to see people posting their hourly rates however. Typophile isn’t really a job-board.

I would recommend contacting some local design firms and speaking with them in person so you can provide them with an accurate description of your context, from which they can prepare you a proposal.

http://www.yellowpages.com.au/find/graphic-designers/broadbeach-qld

“I've hit boiling point with frustration trying to get designers to get this logo right.” and “Against my better judgement I thought I would get a cheaper designer to come up with concepts but as you've seen, they are less than acceptable.”

If I am reading this correctly, you paid less money for a sub-par solution which isn’t working for you. The cause of your frustration most likely stems from an incomplete project brief. Don’t shoot the messenger, but it sounds to me like you need to go back to the drawing board and start over with a thorough brief for sign-off before you proceed any further.

Without this signed off and legally binding document in place, you and your designer will simply end up going in circles debating who’s favourite colour is best. The end result will be an unhappy you with less money and a mark you don’t like, as well as a frustrated designer. Everybody loses. We have all seen this happen more times than we would like, but that’s what you get when you take an aesthetic shot from the hip, hoping to get lucky, compared to following a clearly documented process and making informed decisions by design as opposed to by chance.

I don’t know of any professional design organizations in Broadbeach, but you might have some luck asking other Typophiles on the General Discussions board. I bet we’ve got a few Ausies in here somewhere…

I agree with what Chris said. Talk to a number of designers, look carefully at their portfolios (especially logos), ask for references (the names of some clients you can phone to discuss how the jobs went), and get a written estimate.

If there are any local companies that have nice logos, ask them who designed it.

Keep in mind that "designing a logo" can mean different things to different designers. For a low-bid designer it might just means spending an hour cranking out some top-of-his-head concepts. For a higher-priced designer it might mean spending a ton of time — having in-depth conversations with you about your business, spending many hours coming up with concepts, several meetings with you and lots of logo fine-tuning, design of your stationary (including getting printing bids for you and inspecting the proofs) and maybe designing your website, etc. The old saying "you get what you pay for" is often true.

Hi Shane, to a potential client or even to a first glace viewer of your logo what do you want to impart?

Start there. That's the key. From there your brand will unfold.

Is it open friendly strong no nonsense? How about deep determined thoughtful? Stylish conservative modern and tech savvy? Or is it simply all about trust?

Write it down, make a list, develop a hierarchy of characteristics. Those characteristics that you understand your business/client relationship to be are those that you can comfortably promote. It's not something you can buy off the rack ...what makes E.C. unique to you?

It seems to me you were lost from the beginning ...but not anymore :)

5star's version of amazing grace ...lol.

n.