£500,000? What do I get for that?

Not breaking news I'll grant you, but I still think it's worthy of a blog spot. Boris and the bods of London have hired design agency Saffron to rebrand London at a cost of £500,000. They want a brand that is as successful commercially as the I 'love' NY logo created by Milton Glaser. However I'd argue that London already has a strong 'brand identity'; the colour is red, and the evolving, but still familiar London Transport roundel, adapted to its most successful form by Edward Johnston, the unofficial logo. Of course 'London' cannot officially adopt this symbol for their own. So I see the logic behind wanting a specifically London logo, I'm just skeptical about spending £500,000 on an identity that has to work with the heavy existing personality of London. At worse it’ll be a heavy price tag for an Olympic banner that will blanket London in 2012, only to be then confided to the history books. I hope it’ll understanding the evolving, but traditional nature of the city and create something that grows on Londoners so they believe in it, because if they don’t it’ll never succeed.