A logo brief arrives in our inbox roughly every other day. Over the years, we've reviewed hundreds of them — from solo traders to multi-site businesses, across virtually every industry you can name. And while every brief is different, the same mistakes appear with remarkable regularity.
These aren't obscure technical errors. They're fundamental misunderstandings about what a logo is, what it needs to do, and how to brief a designer to get the best possible result. Getting them wrong doesn't just produce a disappointing logo — it produces one that actively costs the business money through weakened brand credibility, inconsistent application, and eventual expensive redesign.
What a Logo Actually Needs to Do
Before getting into the mistakes, it's worth being clear about the job a logo actually has. A logo's primary function is recognition — not storytelling, not explanation, not inspiration. The Nike swoosh doesn't tell you anything about athletic performance. The Apple logo doesn't explain anything about technology. They work because they're instantly, unmistakably recognisable, and have been consistently applied across thousands of touchpoints over decades.
With that in mind, many common logo brief mistakes stem from asking a logo to do too much.
The Most Costly Logo Design Mistakes
Trying to Tell the Whole Brand Story in the Logo
Logos that attempt to incorporate every product you offer, every value you hold, and every service you provide end up complex, busy, and unrecognisable at small sizes. The most enduring logos in the world are ruthlessly simple. Simplicity is not a limitation — it's the mechanism through which recognition is achieved.
Choosing a Font Because You Like It, Not Because It Works
Typography is one of the most technically demanding elements of logo design. A font that looks elegant at 48pt in a presentation may be completely illegible embroidered on a jacket or printed at 15mm on a pen. Logo typography must work at every size, in every application — and that's a much harder brief than most people realise.
Basing the Design on Trend Rather Than Strategy
Chasing the current design trend for logo design is a guaranteed way to create something that looks dated within three to five years. The logos with the greatest longevity are those built on strategic foundations — a distinctive visual idea rooted in the brand's actual positioning and personality.
Not Testing at Every Scale and Application
A logo that looks beautiful on a computer screen but falls apart on a small business card, disappears when reversed out of a dark background, or becomes unreadable at 10px is not a finished logo. Before any logo is signed off, it must be tested in all real-world applications.
Designing by Committee
Logo design by committee — where every stakeholder's opinion carries equal weight — consistently produces compromised, incoherent results. Good logo design requires a clear decision-maker who trusts the designer's expertise and has the authority to make final calls without endless rounds of conflicting revisions.
Choosing Price Over Quality
A £50 logo from a marketplace platform might feel like a business-savvy decision. But a logo that doesn't represent your brand, doesn't work at multiple scales, wasn't designed with real strategy, and comes with no proper file formats isn't an asset — it's a liability. Your logo will appear on every single piece of marketing you produce for years. The investment in getting it right from the beginning pays dividends indefinitely.
“The brief for a great logo is never 'make it look nice'. It's 'make it work — on everything, at every size, forever'.”
— James Hargreaves, Lancashire Digital Design
Logo Brief Checklist: Set Your Designer Up for Success
- Articulate your brand positioning clearly: who are you, who do you serve, and what makes you different?
- List all the applications your logo needs to work in: digital, print, embroidery, signage, vehicle livery
- Define your colour preferences — but also be open to expert recommendation
- Provide examples of logos you admire (and explain why) — and logos you dislike
- Establish a clear approval process with a single decision-maker
- Expect and budget for a proper design process — not a 24-hour turnaround
- Request final delivery of all file formats: SVG, EPS, PNG (transparent), JPG
Ready to make your mark?
Let's build something that turns heads.
Talk to us about a website that makes the right first impression — every time.
Start a Project