New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art is taking its collection of more than 19,000 items for a ride downtown in two years as it moves from its current location to a new Renzo Piano-designed building right at the southern end of the High Line. With the move, museum execs saw the opportunity to also change up the museum's 13-year-old blocky logo.

Maybe to avoid too much change at once (or so it can be sure to have all the new stationery in place before the new building’s opening), the Whitney unveiled its new logo and visual identity system this week. It consists of a very simple W that Amerstam-based design firm Experimental Jetset apparently sees a lot of symbolism in.Continue reading...

In a bid to redefine the financial journey, ING U.S. has announced that it will be rebranding as Voya Financial. 

While the announcement was made Thursday, ING U.S. does not plan on incorporating the new name or logo until 2014, as it awaits the completion of its IPO. 

ING Group, the company's Dutch parent, announced last year that it was planning to spin off its US arm through an initial public offering—where Voya will register as the company's stock ticker. The divestiture of the US part of the business along with a ING Direct and a Dutch mortgage lender had to take place in order to get approval for a 2008 bailout.Continue reading...

What products would you make smarter? That's the question General Electric is asking in its bid to create consumer-facing products with GE patents. 

No stranger to the Internet of Things, GE has once again partnered with Quirky, a type of social network for inventors to license thousands of its patents to Quirky community members for development.

“There are a host of consumer applications that we haven’t had the ability to focus on,” Beth Comstock, CMO GE told the The New York Times. “That just isn’t our core business.”Continue reading...

After 21 years in business, Caribou Coffee is suddenly facing some very grownup decisions.

America's second-largest coffee chain announced that, as of April 14, it will be closing 80 of its locations and rebranding 88 outposts as Peet's Coffee & Tea over the next 18 months, according to a statement from President and CEO Mike Tattersfield.Continue reading...

Ron Johnson has been ousted as CEO of JCPenney as the retailer's board of directors voted on Monday to turn to his predecessor to pull the company out of the death spiral (it lost $4.3 billion in sales last year) on Johnson's watch, rather than give the former Target executive and Apple retail head the extra time he wanted to see his radical vision through to fruition.

Mike Ullman, who had been CEO of JCPenney until 2011, before Johnson, is returning to take the helm again at least for the time being, according to a JCPenney press release:

"The Board of Directors of J.C. Penney Company, Inc. today announced that Myron E. (Mike) Ullman, III has rejoined the Company as Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. He has also been elected to the Board of Directors. Mr. Ullman is a highly accomplished retail industry executive, who served as CEO of jcpenney until late 2011. He succeeds Ron Johnson, who is stepping down and leaving the Company."

The stock market appreciated the move, which comes on the same day that JCPenney resumed its courtroom clash with Macy's in Manhattan over rights to field the Martha Stewart product lines that Johnson maintained would be crucial to turning around JCPenney's fortunes.Continue reading...

PPR, the multinational holding company that is home to brands including Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, Stella McCartney, Alexander McQueen, Balenciaga, Bottega Veneta, Brioni and Sergio Rossi, is rebranding as Kering, indicative of a transformation from French conglomerate to internationally focused sportswear (encompassing its brands including Puma, Tretorn and Volcom) and luxury-goods group. 

The new name, accompanied by an owl logo and tagline, "Empowering Imagination," is pronounced "caring." CEO Francois-Henri Pinault explains, "We are there to care for the brand and take care of the brand," the Wall Street Journal reports.

Pinault carries on his father’s legacy as founder with the new name, which a press release explains was inspired by family roots in France's Brittany region as "Ker" meaning home in Breton, with the action-associated "ing" implying "doing" and "going."

Manfredi Ricca, the managing director at Interbrand in Milan, commented to the International Herald Tribune that the new identity reflects an awareness that companies need “a strong angle on what they stand for,” both for consumers and for employees, to demonstrate their “overarching vision” and values.Continue reading...

Canada’s oldest retailer launched a major rebranding effort the same week that Target christened its first stores north of the 49th parallel. Coincidence? Maybe, but probably not.

The Bay, which has its roots in Canada’s fur trade, will now be known as Hudson’s Bay. It won’t be that much of a stretch for consumers, considering the new name is a nod to its parent company, Hudson’s Bay Co., but it will mean its unique stylized-ribbon “B” in The Bay will be retired.

A return to the iconic retailer’s classic full name with a word mark—which will be used on all marketing and media materials, as well as online and on in-store displays—is its first major logo rebrand since 1965.Continue reading...

With retailers on all sides of the aisle attempting to become one-stop-shopping and lifestyle platforms, traditional supermarket retailers are moving in that direction as well. Safeway—the megachain with a footprint stretching across much of the United States—has just offered a glimpse at its own attempt to become more things to more people, providing a peek at its new wellness platform slated to launch in the second quarter.

"Today, we're a supermarket company ... selling wellness services and wellness products," CEO Steve Burd told analysts, according to Drug Store News. But within 10 years, he said, Safeway would become a wellness company that happens to sell food.

The impulse for supermarket chains to expand the meaning and capabilities of their brands is understandable, in an environment where mass merchandisers such as Walmart and Target have impinged greatly on their CPG business, and even drug-store chains and dollar stores are selling more groceries. Now Walmart, for example, also is expanding its purview in healthcare and "wellness" as well, beyond the traditional in-store pharmacies long offered by mass discounters and supermarkets alike.Continue reading...