Rebrand made me lose 3 clients in one day - logo change disaster

I was sitting at my desk at 2 PM last Tuesday when the first email hit. A client said our new rounded logo looked like a cartoon tooth. Two more cancelled by 4 PM because the font we switched to made the whole brand feel like a toy company. I spent the whole night reverting everything back to the original sharp edges and bold sans-serif. Has anyone else had a rebrand backfire this fast?

2 comments

2 Comments

nathanking12d ago

Did you have a chance to talk to each client one on one before you hit publish on the new logo? When I rebranded my shop last year I took a really slow approach and sent a few loyal clients a preview first. They hated the new colors so I scrapped the whole thing and kept the old look. Saved me from exactly this kind of mess because I found out before it went live. Sometimes it feels like we rush to change things without testing the water first.

alicebarnes12d ago

Nathanking totally nailed it with that slow approach idea. Testing the water with a few people first would have saved OP a ton of stress and lost money. I get that sometimes you get excited about a fresh look and just want to push it out the door, but that's exactly when things go sideways. Maybe even do a soft launch on a single page or a social post before rolling it out everywhere, see if people actually connect with it. Clients can be really weird about visual changes, especially if they've been with you for a while and associate your brand with a certain feel. It's like they need time to adjust, and ripping the bandaid off all at once never works.