The confusions of "London 2012"

The IOC boss said that London "is doing OK" but that they must now focus on delivering the Games on time. "We urge them to work as soon as possible and to prepare today for the unforeseen of tomorrow," he said in an interview given to the BBC.

Rogge's comments came shortly after the revelation that the main Olympic Stadium will cost nearly 80 per cent more than the original budget - the latest in a series of projected cost overruns that have seriously dented the credibility of the Games organisers.

In the circumstances the furore over the Games logo may seem rather immaterial - although some would see the befuddled story of the logo as accurately standing for confusions elsewhere in the rather casual management of the Games to date to which Rogge was (tactfully) referring.

Inadequate testing of the logo

I recently visited the offices of the London 2012 team in their spacious offices at the top of one of the high buildings in London's Canary Wharf. The purpose of my visit was to try and throw some light on the processes which led to the adoption by Lord Coe and his team of the much reviled Olympics logo.

As far as the London 2012 organisers are concerned, this is a subject from which they have moved on but my persistence did reveal some of the facts - and these do not reflect very well on what happened. When the logo was launched in June, a media had a field day. Sebastian Coe, chairman of the Games organising committee, was in a corner but defended the design stoutly - a defence which was rather undermined when it was revealed that he is colour-blind!

At no point in the marshalling of defence to criticism by the Games organisers was there any attempt to argue that there had been a meticulous process in place for the development of the design. Lord Coe and others argued emotionally and subjectively that the design was (in their opinion) good because it was "edgy" and "not bland".

Wolff Olins (the designers) said that it wanted to give the London 2012 brand a "creative edge" and that it "needed to change perceptions of what the Games are going to be". These are no doubt laudable brand objectives - but what was completely missing from this defence was any reason to believe that the chosen design did what they said it would do.

Most of the doubters and even the fiercest of the critics could have been silenced if reliable evidence had been provided that the logo design had been tested against alternatives with the target groups at which it was to be aimed and that this rigorous process had shown the design to be a winner. No such evidence has been produced and it seems that what research did take place was very limited indeed and did not include comparative testing of alternative designs.

Hiding behind a facile "brand" smokescreen

A spokesman for the London 2012 organising committee (Locog) told me that it "didn't ask Wolf Olins to come up with lots of different designs" but that it 'asked them to develop a brand. This was done by consulting our stakeholders, our sponsors, focus groups etc and coming up with a concept that Locog felt would represent London, its people and reflect the kind of Games we want to stage."

He confirmed that "at the pitch process we didn't ask agencies to spend a lot of time coming up with logos, precisely because we wanted the winning agency to develop one with us" and that "it wasn't a 'beauty parade' of potential logos, it was one concept that was developed over a period of time".

When pressed as to what the London 2012 brand really is all about the spokesman said that it was about "young people" with the implication that the logo would reflect this positioning - although there is no evidence that this supposition has been validated by testing with the youth target group.

Nor was there any test as to whether the logo did "represent London, its people and reflect the kind of Games we want to stage". Personally try as hard as I can I can't see much of the great city of London in the Logo at all - can you?

Alright on the day?

Almost all Olympic Games go through bad periods in the development phase but generally everything turns out alright in the end - London's tax payers will certainly be hoping that Lord Coe and his team will soon get the project back on track.

But to have saddled themselves quite unnecessarily with a brand symbol that is so trite and was so untested seems a particularly unnecessary burden.