Besides being Buffalo, New York’s only baseball team, the Buffalo Bisons are a pretty well respected franchise among triple A baseball affiliates. The club is run by a strong ownership and management team.

Which is why I was so incredibly surprised by their recent logo catastrophe.

In 2008, the Bisons ended their long MLB affiliation with the Cleveland Indians and signed with the New York Mets. Mrs. audio’connell grew up a Mets fan so that change pleased this household to no end. I like the Bisons no matter what so I don’t particularly care who they are affiliated with.

However when I saw the new logo the Met’s change brought with it, I was thrilled! A major league looking logo! The team had looked Triple A for so long in its branding, I was pleased to see the upgrade and immediately went out and bought lots of merch!

Well unfortunately for a multitude of reasons, the affiliation with the Mets didn’t work out and the Bisons organization executed a change to affiliate with the Toronto Blue Jays. While not a baseball expert, I think this move will really work out well for the Bisons.

The bad news is the team must have had a covert logo design contest among area 7th Grade design students to help Buffalo create the Bisons new logo under the new affiliation agreement with the Toronto Blue Jays.

Yes, you are seeing correctly, the red, white and blue logo is the NEW logo…not an old resurrected from 1947 logo. That’s the new one.

Shockingly horrible, isn’t it. To call it fugly is to be complimentary.

Are you saying to yourself, why didn’t they just take the Mets logo and change it to the Blue Jays color scheme? I know I asked that question too but then I guessed there might be a legal thing with the Mets on the old logo and oh well.

I look at this logo in the same way I look at our city, regional and state governments here and I ask the same question: is this the best we could do?

Tags: branding, commentary, logo design, marketing by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
4 Comments »

Now if everybody goes to Voicebank.net all at the same time to view my listing as the featured voice talent of the week, you may crash their servers and they’ll find a way to blame me for that and the fiscal cliff.

So visit it when you get a moment, just not all at once, to see me as one of this week’s featured talents…then if you have a job for me, call my agents over at Voice Talent Productions (where I am, ahem, NOT a featured voice talent) so we can make sure the Sheppards have a Merry Christmas too.

It’s possible that you may have to refresh the screen to see my listing as it’s one of about 4-5 in rotation this…listen to all of them as they are all very talented voice-over artists.

Tags: advertising, commentary, marketing, voice talent, voiceover by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
Comments Off on voicebank’s featured voice talent is very cute

It struck me when I watched this commercial how critical excellent casting was to the success of the message and the comedy.

I suppose I should try and make some bigger point here but, um, really that’s all I had to say on the matter. The spot was well cast.

Tags: advertising, commentary, marketing, tv, video by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
4 Comments »

Since about the age of 18, I have been an ardent supporter of Arby’s.

At UD, many days I would eat there for breakfast lunch and dinner and I still lunch there occasionally. So with all the money I have poured into the place, I have an unofficially vested interest in any branding change, regardless of your opinions of my eating habits.

So when I saw this hideous excuse for a logo change, I asked why? I asked it for two reasons.

1. The current logo describes very nicely the food and ambiance of the stores, especially the newer stores.

2. The new logo looks like crap. I tried to be more artful than that but words failed me.

The new logo is crap and it doesn’t matter what their new branding direction is – if the chain is not going to be Arby’s, then change the name and menu and move on. But if you plan on remaining Arby’s, true to the iconic nature of your brand (build with comparatively little branding vs. it’s main competitors in the fast-food area) then tweak the logo if you must.

Keeping the hat and changing the word mark in this way is more than a tweak, it’s a bastardization and if I was a franchisee with the looming costs involved in changing signage to this new craptastic logo, I would be pissed!

You can offer a differing opinion, but you’ll be wrong! 😉

Tags: advertising, branding, logo design, marketing by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
4 Comments »

Are you plagued by those little business oriented tasks that you never get around to even after months or years?

You know, the simple stuff that for whatever reason never seems to get accomplished?

Well, you probably don’t have that problem but I do.

Or in one instance, I can now say, I DID have that problem but now I can check it off my list.

When Mrs. audio’connell and I have purchased new cars, we’ve always agreed that the dealership did NOT get to put their logoed license plate frame or logoed sticker on our cars. It’s only because the dealership wouldn’t pay our $15,000 advertising fee (we go lots of cool places in our cars and our bumpers are seen by all the beautiful and influential people). We thought $15K a very reasonable rate considering it was a one time fee that would cover the life of the car. We even offered to let them take it off invoice.

And yet, no takers.

So our cars are un-dealerized. But I respected the value of that ad space/real estate and I vowed one day, I would claim that space for my own.

I think we bought our last car three years ago so how am I doing on THAT to-do list?!

Well under the category of better late than never, Da’s car now has a lovely etched (high falutin’!) customized license plate frame.

No, we didn’t pay the extra fee for a customized plate (that feels like giving away money to NY State) and no, we will do whatever it takes to AVOID New York State’s fugly orange and blue 1970’s color license plates.

But I like the simple and subtle message on the new plate frame that may not get everyone’s attention…just that special someone, with a voice-over need and a checkbook.

Tags: advertising, branding, commentary, marketing, voice talent, voiceover by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
7 Comments »

As you may know if you’ve read this blog ever, I can be somewhat obsessed with business cards.

Well as my branding recently changed slightly to be “Your Friendly, Neighbohood Voice-Over Talent” I decided I should update the business cards too.

So I did but I have come to a creative stumbling block for which your help is humbly requested and gratefully accepted (although it’s likely if I don’t pick your favorite, you’ll never speak to me again).

Everyone who has seen the front of the cards (the white side) really likes that design. So that’s staying.

But I came up with two designs for the back (both red versions) and I’m not sure which I like better (and I mean that sincerely, I do NOT have a fav, I like them both).

So please let me know from these two choices for the back of the card, which would you choose?

We will call the choices:

A. No Microphone (just red)
B. With Microphone

Thanks for your help.

Tags: advertising, logo design, marketing, silliness by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
33 Comments »