Why Jaguar’s controversial new logo actually signals a big shift in car branding

Carmakers are signaling their move from combustion to electric vehicles with new logos that are lighter, rounder, and more lowercase.

The tantrums thrown across social media over the past few weeks in reaction to Jaguar’s redesign have once again revealed a fundamental contradiction underlying contemporary branding. According to its practitioners, it is supposed to differentiate and distinguish companies and their products, allowing them to stand out from the crowd, a line of thinking that was reinforced just last month when New York creative agency &Walsh rolled out its new mantra, “Find your weird.” But any attempt to do something even slightly weird with regard to advertising, marketing, or logo design is typically met by legions of armchair brand analysts taking to LinkedIn to declare it a failure. In Jaguar’s case, though, many took it a step further, viewing the rebrand as some sort of personal affront.