Color Charge

For more than 40 years, Xerox has been the synonym for paper photocopies. Their Xerox 914 plain paper photocopiers absolutely changed the copying and printing market in 1961 - year of adoption of the current name ‘Xerox’, instead of the previous ‘The Haloid Company’. They introduced in 1963 the Xerox 813, the first desktop plain paper copier, later the first workstations, color printers… they are so popular, that wherever you are, you will say ‘please xerox this document for me’.

In the first business week of 2008 (January 7^th), they released a new brand. If you analyze the previous logos and their business history, you’ll understand better why they don’t want to be recognized as the ‘copier company’, or ‘document company’ anymore. The Xerox brand has evolved during the 20^th century (not all logos included, only the most relevant):

Accordingly to their history, and their vision, Xerox isn’t only a ‘copier company’ because it plays an important, but widely unknown role in personal computers industry. If you unacceptable didn’t know until now, it was Xerox PARC which produced the first concepts and modern computing methods you’re using right now: the mouse and the graphical user interface (GUI). They released the Xerox Star, the first commercial workstation system, mixing window-based GUI, a mouse, networking, file and printing servers, and e-mail. However, there was only a big problem: $16,000 per station - aimed for corporate customers.

These inventions were of such interest that in 1979, several Apple Computer (now Apple Inc.) employees (including Steve Jobs) visited the lab, seeking for ideas for further commercial products. Five years later, the Apple Macintosh was introduced, and the personal computer became widely popular. This movement generated an uncomfortable situation to Xerox, that forced them to sue Apple over their use of GUI, in late 1980s. However, the case was dismissed due Xerox delays, and Xerox lose its mainstream place in personal computers history.

It seems that even after more than 40 years of losing its place, Xerox still wants recognition on those achievements:

The new Xerox logo is now a lowercase treatment of the Xerox name - in a vibrant red - alongside a sphere-shaped symbol sketched with lines that link to form an illustrative “X,” representing Xerox’s connections to its customers, partners, industry and innovation, and designed to be more effectively animated for use in multi-media platforms.

Without any remorse for past achievements, I think Xerox needs to copy more of Kodak’s typography, or buy an inspiring Pokémon Balls.