KEY POINTS:
Back in 2002 when the last attempt to rebrand Auckland City broke out, Mayor John Banks squashed the idea. "I don't want to spend any time or ratepayers' money worrying about silly slogans. I'm not unhappy about City of Sails. I'm interested in moving Auckland forward with the big issues. City of Sails will do me fine."
This time round, he didn't have a chance to put a well-placed spanner in the works. On assuming office, bureaucrats presented him and newly elected councillors with an officer-hatched fait accompli - a new sail-free city council logo, looking very much like a semi-deflated triangle. Caught unprepared, mayor-again Banks admitted to a local paper he knew nothing about it, but liked the look of it, and couldn't remember the old one.
Well I do remember the old one and, like the Banksie of old, I dislike the wasting of ratepayers' money on silly slogans. Especially when all the $25,000 (publicly confirmed) design exercise has thrown up is this floppy pyramid. The existing logo, with its two triangular sails and Rangitoto in the background might be 25 years old, but so what? It still seems more relevant than the inexplicable new shape.
What could be more Auckland than sails and a volcano? Well the only thing I can think of that might be more archetypal is the way the city bureaucrats slid this decision through the system in the interregnum of an election campaign. Chief executive David Rankin and his top managers adopted the new logo a month ago, as the election campaign warmed up, after earlier consultation with then mayor Dick Hubbard and three senior councillors from both the left and right.
The last kerfuffle over the city council's logo erupted in 2002 when new councillor Doug Armstrong demanded a return to the old slogan City of Sails, which had been adopted at the birth of the enlarged city in 1989. Ten years later, this had been replaced with First City of the Pacific by the Fletcher council, but the sail logo was retained.
Councillors in 2002 were presented with various branding options by marketing gurus. Bottom of the range was a bargain basement $10,000 proposal which involved slinging a few City of Sails banners around the waterfront. At the other end of the scale was a $3 million option to rebrand every cup, sign and piece of stationery.
A report lectured councillors on "Auckland City brand personality" and concluded that "to create a unique Auckland City personality ... there needs to be agreement on what Auckland City's personality should be".
It all got so anal that councillors wisely decided to abandon the exercise, agreeing instead to drop all slogans and stick solely with the old sails logo, accompanied by the simple wording, Auckland City. Recreation committee chairman Scott Milne wisely noted, "It's not seen as a priority. It's very difficult to get ratepayers to see it as value for money."
Another problem, he noted, was that "the media query it". He was one of the three senior politicians consulted by the bureaucrats this time round. All then retired, so escaping any possible ratepayer wrath.
The bureaucrats argue that they have added "council" to Auckland City because "customers" were confused about who they were dealing with. It's a rather debatable point, I would have thought, but hardly the issue. The additional word could have been added quietly without a redesign of the whole logo surely? After all, we're not talking the rebranding of cornflakes or a hugely expensive brand of watches, we're discussing a city council badge.
Then there's timing. Were the bureaucrats really so blind to the raging election battle over ballooning rates bills? Or insensitive enough not to care? They argue that only minuscule amounts are involved, but it's impossible to believe that $25,000 is the end of the matter.
The other imponderable is the Royal Commission into Auckland governance.
Do we really need a new logo if, in a year to two, the only place to display it will be on the city's tombstone?
