See? I TOLD You So!

What timing my last entry was! I say this because only a few short hours after writing about the importance of applying your own library identity to its materials, I found myself walking past one of our customer service desks in the Youth section. On that desk was a pad of paper used for patrons to leave comments. I was horrified—yes, horrified—to see that the logo used was the international symbol for “library.” Not ours. I tore off a page to scan and share with you here (see above).


Thus, the importance of my earlier advice on visual identity subverted right here—at my own library! Tsk...heads should roll! 


I had hoped to say that this was a generic off-the-shelf pad ordered from some service, but I think more likely it wasn’t, due to the locations of the library name, the misalignment of the ends of the rules, capitalizing the word “Member,” and not capitalizing the word “Date” at the bottom to match the capitalized “Date” at the top.


Seeing that comment pad reminded me of something though. I thought I recalled seeing an old stationery envelope from our library that used the international library symbol. I scrounged around in the office, and sure enough, I unearthed one of two remaining old envelopes to show that we too once used the international symbol as our identity mark. Shame on us! Fortunately, somewhere along the way this changed and we now use our own identity on our stationery system.


Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for some of our library vehicles. I have noticed they continue to use the international library symbol on them. I can understand that using the international symbol is a very quick and efficient way for people to recognize they are looking at a library vehicle—especially while it is a moving target—but, the symbol is not us. Think of it this way: if every shoe store and shoe brand in the world used the very same exact silhouette of a shoe as their logo...+ their name. That’s precisely what we’re doing with this international symbol for the library.


As for the still used comment pad and vehicle, rest assured. I will get to the bottom of this serious infraction of branding standards.