It’s official – this pouncing pussy will become Penrith’s new logo next year.
A cramped, less colourful rendering was revealed in Phil Gould’s Sydney Morning Herald late last month. On September 5th the NRL lodged the updated design above with IP Australia who have indexed it here.
Some people will love it. Some will loathe it. Some will wish that the club just went back to the OG 80’s logo on which it is based. It’s a question of personal taste.
The name of the club, however, is a matter of brand strategy. Which begs the question: what happened to ‘Penrith’?
The Panthers seem set to scrub their suburban identity in an attempt to broaden their base and become a team for all of western Sydney. The club’s 50th anniversary next season won’t be about marking time. It will be about moving on – delicately easing existing fans into a new commercial era.
It seems smart enough. Throw your brand net across a bigger population pool and you’ll supposedly trawl more support. But I doubt it will make any difference to the Panthers’ current plight. Because making your brand more generic doesn’t make you more inclusive.
Last year Sports Business Insider broke the story that Penrith had registered the name ‘Western Sydney Panthers’. The club came out and denied any intent to punt out ‘Penrith’, but there was a proviso. As Phil Gould told the Sydney Morning Herald last May: “We don’t intend to use it at this time but it is there if every [sic] in the future it is needed”.
Fast forward to August this year and Penrith attempts to leverage a greater western Sydney identity by purchasing the Wanderers. I’m sure the word ‘synergy’ would have been smattered across the bid document had the FFA not blocked the sale.
Now ‘Penrith’ seems kaput. It’s all ‘hey hey, we’re the Panthers’.
I don’t know how shaking off a team’s local heritage can possibly make it matter more. Denying who you are helps no one. What is a brand without individual character?
Shying away from the Penrith name will be sold to fans as a cold commercial reality. Fans will have to like it or lump it.
Contrast this with the consultative approach taken by the Wanderers, who went to the fans and directly let them shape the club’s image.
It’s this engagement process, not the name itself, that sold so many fans onto the Wanderers. It gave proof that the club was theirs from the ground-floor up. As Wanderers Executive Chairman Lyall Gorman put it, success comes down to “giving the fan what they really want”.
Who asked Penrith fans whether their suburban name should stay in their logo? The Panthers appear to want what the Wanderers have, but without letting go and giving ownership of the club’s identity over to the fans. Members were given a sneak peak of the logo at an information night on August 28th, but by then the dye was cast.
Before writing this piece I approached Penrith to let them explain what their new logo represents and what went into the design process. They have chosen to make no comment until the official launch. It’s a pity fans aren’t getting the full story. Why dangle the logo out in a daily paper if you don’t want to discuss it?
Penrith aren’t the first team to equate thinking big with breaking away from the past. North Melbourne were simply the ‘Kangaroos’ for a period. Canterbury became the baseless ‘Bulldogs’. Both have realised the value of their historic brand equity and returned to their suburban roots. I wonder if the greater western Sydney Panthers will one day do the same?
