There is one surefire way to make your client's logo bigger without actually making their logo bigger, but it is reserved for only the most desperate situations. You must have exhausted all other possibilities. Moreover, you must have run out of any patience, respect for your client, and scruples. Here's how it works.
You present the work with the too-small logo, and the client explains that its size must be increased. Don't argue. Instead, listen very carefully, nodding, drawing out detail and nuance. Make it clear that this is a matter of importance and complexity, and the client is right to focus on it. Finally, announce, as if it's just then occurring to you, that there is only one way to get this exactly right, to make sure that the client is absolutely pleased. You will prepare not one, but five options, changing the size of the logo on each one just ever so slightly. In this way, and in this way alone, can a reliable decision be made. Take my word for it: no client will turn down this offer, since the one thing these kind of people like more than arguing about logo sizes is looking at lots of options. Take the work away and promise to return to the next meeting with this exercise ready for review.
Prepare a new presentation with five different logo sizes: big, slightly bigger, slightly bigger again, slightly bigger still again, and biggest. Ideally, the difference between in the sizes should be maddeningly imperceptible. At the next meeting, and with a bit of ceremony, lay them out before the client left to right, smallest to biggest. To enable a robust discussion, the options should be labeled 1 through 5. As you spread them out, say, "We started with the original and changed the size in increments of [insert some small unit of measurement here] so we could get a really good choice." Let the client examine this array. This is a period of intense deliberation, partly because the difference in the sizes is so hard to distinguish. Into the silence that inevitably ensues, with some hesitancy, offer your point of view. "After looking at them all together for a while, we decided that number 5 was really a bit too big, and we were torn between 3 and 4." If the client is polite, they will pretend to care about your opinion for a moment. If not, they won't waste time. Either way, they'll announce that number 5 is the best and that's the one that should be used. Just for the hell of it, at this point you might want to try to make a (no doubt futile) case for number 4. But it doesn't matter: you won.
You may have already guessed how this works.
When you put together the presentation, the logo from the previous meeting—the size you originally showed—is number 5, not number 1, and the options are all incrementally smaller, not incrementally bigger. But notice that you never claim otherwise. You say only that you've "changed the size ever so slightly"—true. You say, as you lay them out, "Here's number one...two's a little bigger...a little bigger again..." etc.—true again! Even your (admittedly cruel and perverse) advocacy for option 4 is based on an unspoken but nonetheless legitimate realization that the logo was actually too big in the first place, not too small. If you are very careful, you never have to lie at all.
Like all con games, this one is based on the illusion that the sucker has the advantage. In this case, it's the conviction that this kind of client always has that it's your job to do as they say. Little do they realize that your final allegiance is not to them, but to the quality of the work, something that you cannot in good conscience permit them to jeopardize with their lack of taste.
Two last things. The key thing is to make sure that no copies of the original presentation are left behind, lest they be produced for comparison's sake at the second presentation. You can usually secure the original by explaining that you need them to create the painstaking variations, and moreover that you can't bear the idea of flawed design work remaining in circulation. Finally, if the worst happens and you actually get caught, just blame the whole thing on a misunderstanding by an intern the client has never met that you will fire as soon as you return to your office.
For the record, I have never actually done this.
Michael Bierut is a partner in the New York office of Pentagram and a founder of Design Observer.
Comment on this Post
I've done a variation of this where I purposely make the logo too-small by 5 or 10%, then when they invariably come back wanting the logo larger (because don't they always want it bigger...), you've already got it in the bag!
Too funny!!!!!! ;)
and what about the logo heading this blog?! ;)
This post is good Michael, but could you perhaps make it a little bigger? Thanks.
I'll let you know how this works...wish I had thought of it first.
Very good customer service oriented strategy. I thank my lucky stars that I have never had to resort to this sort of chicanery. Once I actually left the logo off of a cutting edge design in order to get the client to focus on that as their main critique. It worked!
Great write up Michael. :) On the other hand, you could come in with a 5'x10' version and show your client just how much you really "stand behind" (literally) their idea for a bigger logo. Then pray they have a great sense of humor. :)
Haha, Daniel.
It's a win-win situation for both parties. Great advice, Michael.
ha, ha, I have seen and experienced clients with foot ruler and keep the photocopy of the original work in their files. some are so obsessed with their company logo and and we can play or sing that popular number "make the logo bigger"!!! Enjoy the link: http://www.creativetechs.com/iq/make_the_logo_bigger_the_song.html
best,
umd
I once overheard a fight with marketing and one of my art directors; "No you see, we intentionally made that smaller." VP of marketing; "well then, intentionally make it bigger!"
Love this sneaky idea. I may have to try it next time I run across that situation. Check out one of my favorite sites with a video about the fictitious Make My Logo Bigger Cream. It's a riot.
http://www.makemylogobiggercream.com/
Awesome. I sent this on to a few of my designer friends. You could also do this with color variations or any other detail your client "knows better than you" about.
Brilliant!
Nice one Michael! Reminds me of the old paste up days and the art director always made me move prints 1mm here and there. Getting tired of his predictable practise I used to go away, wait for a while maybe cut through some type but never move it. The go back always to be met with the same comment "That's so much better, can't you see the difference"
Oh please, just give the client what he/she/it wants. Big. Bigger. BIGGEST. Lwt them decide. Get your money. Make your client happy. Done. If this story had a sound, it would be a whine. Designers should be smarter than this whole argument.
MB
when i have non-designers sending me this link, you can tell you've hit a nerve. ever thought of going into acupuncture?
@ Tony Moxham
Your a disgrace to the design community. Of course, there are projects that call for such nonsense. But obviously your not one of the smart designers you have mentioned.
Michael said it the best, our "allegiance is not to them, but to the quality of the work"
I love it...now, can we just change everything.
@ Tony M...really dude? It's a humorous post, not a dis on your mom. C'mon!
hahaha, I loved the intern bit. Thats fantastic.
Come on... All you have to do is either decrease the size of the matte board ever so slightly or.... place a thin box rule around the logo on the matte that decreases slightly. The visual magnetism that is created by the frames will pull or push at the image's size.
Wow, remind me not to hire anyone who thinks this. The work doesn't pay you; the "them" does. If you want to be an artist, go on your own and hope someone likes it enough to pay you for it. If you want to be a designer, then respect the desires of the people paying you. In other words, the golden rule -- "He who has the gold, makes the rules."
"Wow, remind me not to hire anyone who thinks this. The work doesn't pay you; the "them" does. If you want to be an artist, go on your own and hope someone likes it enough to pay you for it. If you want to be a designer, then respect the desires of the people paying you. In other words, the golden rule -- "He who has the gold, makes the rules."
It's that specific attitude that Henry Ford alludes to when he talks about his customers wanting "a faster horse"
If you want to be a service vendor "yessir" man, then you should be a production artist, not a designer. A designer's job is to solve problems, not be a set of hands for a client that can't execute for themselves.
Why else pay so much money to consult a studio or agency?
And it's not a designer playing artist in these situations, a designer has had enough formal training and experience to rationalize the proportions / spacing / emphasis of graphic elements to know why he made something a specific size. This isn't an emotional art decision, this is a fundamental proportions and gridding decision.
I feel that clients tend to get emotional about these sort of decisions, because it tends to be the only "fun" thing they get to do with these sort of projects. They also have a significant financial investment, and feel that they have to intervene somewhere along in the process to validate the expense. I've seen many clients do just that. They aren't thinking about the end user, optical proportions and hierarchy to communicate messages. They just have gut reactions.
As Bierut said, sometimes clients just get completely irrational, and you are frustrated beyond your means. This is in action taken to better the briefed project, not to please the clients personal preferences.
"For the record, I have never actually done this."
it's a hilarious and therapeutic article about a common request all designers get at some point in their careers. i don't think everyone should be getting their pants in a twist over it...
This is hilarious! But I don't believe MB is seriously suggesting we try this. Note that he states: "only when you have...run out of scruples" and "I have never done this" etc. It's humor, not a real suggestion.
For those who are taking it seriously, imho there is no design job so sacred that I would ever lie or cheat a client in this or another way. Simple ethics. In these admittedly frustrating and difficult situations I either cut my losses with the client or do what the person paying is asking of me and move on.
Regardless, MB said this is for when you have run out of patience and respect for your client. Those who have been there know that by that time, the rest of the job is so compromised anyway the size of the logo is a small issue in comparison.
since I don't know their work, can anyone tell me if Tony Moxham or Sameal Images have ever produced any work that is worth studying? Anything that might be pored over in design schools or discussed in the press in ten years time? Or is their rallying cry for mediocrity typical of what they produce?
Oh my gosh, I'm actually excited about my next "make the logo bigger" conversation so I can try this little trick, its so crafty!
An argument from authority; what fun.
Alvin, a few questions when you are designing:
- Are you working for a design school?
- Are you working for the press?
- Or are you working for the people who are writing your check?
Speaking as someone who has written a number of those checks in the past (and will do so again in the future), I will hire someone who is designing for his/her own glory (Wow, that Alvin's an amazing designer) exactly once.The designer I want is one who helps me with my business problem and does so in as elegant a fashion as possible within the existing constraints. Not an 'artiste' who's more concerned with how it's going to affect his/her reputation (I have to deal with enough engineers prima donnas and marketing mavens as it is).
I've tried this and it doesn't always work. I've had more than one client say "I know you worked hard on this and we can probably live with #5 but I'd like to see it even bigger. Just make it like 15% bigger and show me so I can see I'm wrong. I need to see it." That last sentence is why clients pay agencies. They can't visualize anything.
The Internet has killed lightheartedness and fun. Not everything needs to be a pissfest, folks. Relax and let's laugh WITH and AT each other just a bit. C'mon, you can do it.
This was a superb post.
Why not just make the logo bigger by making it bigger?
I appreciate the humor in this article. Very good.
As we're moving office in these days we are having to throw out some boxes of early work from about a decade ago when we were doing a lot of design, and when i truly would have raging fits over things like the size of a logo, anyway, ten years after the fact and with all the emotion drained out of the work i genuinely must admit now that perhaps the logo in some cases could have been a little bigger. So there you go.
Dear Alvin,
Thanks for your query. Alas I cannot quantify the worth or shelf life of any of my work other than to say I like what I've done and so do most folks I've worked for or with. I've also never been a fan of mediocrity, nor would I wish that on anyone in any area of life. Design students should, I hope, be better using their time and talents on soooooo many other topics worth studying. My suggestion . . . if you're paid by someone else to do a job, don't ever belittle them by offering them confusing and pointless "options" . . . grow up and think of how to solve the problem from a different angle. If that's not possible within your talents as a designer then best remember who's paying you and who you should be making happy. U can see what I now do for work (my boss is myself and my boyfriend) at dfcasa.com. Hope u like.
Funny! I found this post after I had said that I'm not willing to make the client's logo any bigger, but I was open to making their Web site smaller.
Love the post, but didn't anyone else notice that this piece, although clever, is conceptually flawed?
Seeing as you would have already had to present it to the client (the tastefully scaled logo), debated the merits of size and subtlety, and thus run out of patience, you could never arrive back at the point in which you are now under-sizing the logo, presenting 1-5, etc....
I know, I know. It's a humor piece, but still...
This is a great article, I'm glad I came across your blog.
This is just great! Thanks for sharing.
I think I'm more relieved that even Michael Beirut has to do this! I was starting to think that I was inheriting all the retarded clients!
LOL. A bloody good ideas. Nice post, made me laugh.
I haven't ever used this technique, but I am guilty of showing a draft revision with absolutely no changes on it. Then, of course, I ask the client if they think the logo is big enough now.
Wow. That's a pretty good idea. It's always good to know that you can "put the power" in your clients hands without ever really letting go of it.
Pretty funny, and it sounds great on paper, but I have done this, and it failed. I had a client who was stalling because (we found out later) he didn't want to pay, and somehow thought if we as designers couldn't satisfy his whims, he got the work for free.
I was asked, quite seriously, "Can you send me different versions in every shade of blue, from darkest to lightest."
*Facepalm*
@ Tony Moxham
Our need to do the best for our client means that we will do our best to stop them hurting themselves.
Sure, if we made the logo bigger, the client would be happy at first. Later they'd be disappointed (maybe even angry) when the design didn't do what it was supposed to do (generate sales, leads, whatever) because consumers of the finished artwork had been distracted by bad design decisions.
Just being a"yes" man is doing your client a disservice.