"I Know a Good Idea When I Steal One!"

I'm no model lady.

A model's just

an imitation of

the real thing

Mae West

There are many great quotes about imitation. The most famous being "Imitation is the sincerest (form of) flattery", attributed to Charles Caleb Colton. The quote above from Mae West is good as well. But my all-time favorite is from one of my college art professors, Dee Schaad, and is featured as the title of this post.

As this quote implies, a great idea is often inspired by what someone else has done before you. In my office I have floor to ceiling bookcases with scores of books that are filled with examples of great design. In the design world these are often referred to as "swipe books". Used properly, they are a source of inspiration, application and direction. 

I do believe seeing what someone else has done and adapting it to what you are doing is sometimes a valid way to arrive at a good design solution. I've just never been the one being imitated before – until now . . .

A couple years ago I partnered with my friends at Fishhook (a big shout-out to all my Fishhook peeps!) for branding and identity work for Kingsway Christian Church (an added bonus was that this is also my home church). It was exciting to see their communications team envisioning a new logo as a part of a much larger community outreach effort. There were MANY meetings and a huge amount of work that went into the project before my pencil ever touched the sketchbook.

There are too many factors that contribute to why we landed on the logo we did to list here, but suffice it to say that it was a huge success. A teaser campaign was created and there was a "what's the deal with that 'k' we're seeing everywhere" kind of buzz in the community. For the record, here's the symbol element of the logo:

For the curious, you can read more about the work on the Fishhook site; see examples of the great ways the brand has been extended across a variety of venues and applications on my site; and even see the results from last Fall's aerial photo of Kingsway's congregation, gathered together in colored T-shirts to form a giant Kingsway logo, here.

If I haven't mentioned it, I'm extremely proud of this work. And apparently it (and the community impact it had) seems to have caught the attention of a few other very nearby congregations. For example, Grace Pointe Church recently unveiled their new logo:

Amusing similarities, don't you think? Of course, they weren't the first. That distinction belongs to Lakeview Christian Church with their re-branding:

I do give them points for using capital letters though. And then I had to laugh when I drove past Plainfield First Assembly of God a couple months ago en route to my daughter's daycare and saw this outside their building:

It seems we've started something of a movement in church logo design. And in all honesty, I find it very, very cool. It makes me feel good about the work we created for our friends at Kingsway. It makes me happy for them, as they must see this and feel good about the decision to move in a very untraditional direction in order to reach the unchurched community around them. And it makes me feel like these other churches must have noticed the outreach potential Kingsway had tapped into and wanted to adapt that to their own efforts – which is not a bad thing at all!

And somewhere, bent over a spinning potter's wheel, Dee Schaad is smiling!

Comments

[James]

At what point in the process is a shared/stolen/imitated idea simply more noise? Kingsway led the way so they benefited but aren't the others evenually going to become just another-ran?

[Todd Adkins]

A good question. I think the impact factor is certainly diluted after too many folks start doing the same thing.

Where it may still hold potential is for their people to have a rallying point – and as a means to have a conversation starter. The concept behind Kingsway's teaser campaign was to get people to ask what the "k" was all about. That provided an easy-to-walk-through open door to tell someone about their church.

Not sure if these other congregations are approaching it this way or not.

And generally, imitated ideas don't appear in such number, and in such close proximity to the one being imitated.

I wonder if anyone at these congregations asked the same question you did?