Top 10 Rebrand Fails

As their popularity declined in the 2010s, Yahoo decided to change their logo. During their "30 Days of Change" campaign in 2013, they showcased a new logo every day for a month. It was a potentially confusing idea for users who weren’t aware of the campaign. The cherry on top was that when their actual new logo was unveiled on the last day, it was basically just a less whimsical version of the original. Considering how many fun styles had been featured, it seemed odd to go with the safest choice. The contest unfortunately wasn’t enough to bring Yahoo back to their original popularity, and the site was eventually sold in 2017.

If you have fond childhood memories of visiting your local shopping center, you may recall passing the Sears department store. The chain’s logo has been ever-evolving since before the 1900s, but a confusing change in 2019 garnered the most criticism. In hopes of conveying uplifting positivity, Sears added a brand new logo after its name. The light green outline was meant to represent a mixture of a home, a heart, and an infinity loop, signifying comfort and continuance. Most casual consumers didn’t follow the abstract message of the sketch, and many noted the rebrand’s awkward similarity to the Airbnb insignia. A slight alteration in 2020 wasn’t received any better, and you won’t currently find this signage over any of Sears’s 11 remaining physical locations.

Launched in 1992, SyFy has long been a bastion for science-fiction content. For the better part of two decades, the channel name was spelled like the genre: sci-fi - with a c and some i’s. But in 2009, the name was suddenly changed to SyFy, spelled s-y-f-y. Network officials pointed out that it was easier to trademark than the name of the genre itself. But it baffled and enraged viewers, who felt that the new name, with its phonetic but incorrect spelling, was ridiculous. The promo that announced the change didn’t make anyone feel better.

AOL was one of the original chat sites, and when their popularity began to dwindle in the 2000s, they were desperate to regain their user base. In 2009, they decided to revamp, changing their font to something much more serious and business-like. Consumers weren’t impressed; the company had sacrificed the 90s flair and nostalgia-value of their logo without offering much in its place. Perhaps to keep things fun, they did superimpose the logo on a bunch of different backgrounds; but it just looked like they’d pasted a boring logo on some random stock photos.

For decades, RadioShack was the premier location for everyone’s radio needs. However, as tech continued to advance, the store couldn’t keep up, and their sales dwindled. In 2009, they attempted to appeal to a younger demographic by renaming themselves “The Shack”. They also started to shift their focus more towards more modern devices, such as cell phones. Unfortunately, increased sales of cell phones came at the cost of decreased sales elsewhere. Confusingly, they kept both names, making it look like they were called “Radio Shack The Shack”. The refresh ultimately wasn’t enough to resuscitate the business, and they filed for bankruptcy in 2015.

Corporations don’t always rebrand to reach a new demographic. Sometimes, they do it to distance themselves from their own awful reputation. In the 2000s, Cable TV provider Comcast became infamous for being unreliable, particularly when it came to customer service. It got so bad that they lost over 600,000 subscribers in 2009 alone. So they decided to rebrand their cable TV service as Xfinity. Shockingly enough, this did not make people forget all their trials and tribulations with the company. While there were promises to address the customer service issues, perhaps that could have been the sole focus, rather than disassociation!

Sometimes, it takes a disastrous relaunch to reignite consumer passion. After decades, GAP decided to switch things up by taking the classic blue box around their name, and moving it to the top right hand corner. The backlash they received was swift and harsh. They hadn’t realized how attached people had become to the original design. GAP quickly realized they had sunk $100 million into a choice people hated. They received so much flack that they reverted back to the original logo after just a week!

When a brand already has a minimal design, it can be risky to make any changes. Mastercard learned this lesson in 2006, when MasterCard International changed its name to MasterCard Worldwide, and added a new corporate logo with a third circle. This third circle was supposed to be a “forward-moving transparent lens” that “represents an introspective view of the company, while illuminating the breadth, depth, and forward thinking viewpoint of MasterCard Worldwide”. Wow, all that just from a circle, eh? Well, the result just looked messy! Despite criticism, Mastercard kept the logo until 2016, when they finally removed the unsightly third circle.

Relaunching a business’s identity can’t erase the harm it’s caused. British Petroleum, more commonly known as BP, are associated with various environmental catastrophes. The company wanted to shake that image with a new logo and name that made them seem environmentally friendly. If only it were that simple … In the early 2000s, they rebranded to ‘Beyond Petroleum’, and made their logo a happy green sun. However, the new brand was derided as greenwashing. A new series of disasters, such as the Deepwater Horizon explosion in 2010, didn’t help. Nor have accusations that BP’s role in the fossil fuel industry contributes to climate change.

New Coke is the textbook case for failed rebrands. In 1985, Coca-Cola decided to reformulate the recipe behind Coke, and release it as the aptly named “New Coke.” While some consumers were open to trying the new, sweeter recipe, others weren’t so easily convinced. Customers from the southeastern United States were especially angry, as they considered Coke part of their culture and identity. Not only did the company receive over 40,000 complaints about the change– they were called out by prominent figures like Johnny Carson and David Letterman. The reaction was so intense that the corporation eventually re-released the old version alongside the new one— and ended up discontinuing the latter quietly in the early 2000s.