WWG… a registered brand!
Brand, brands and companies
We are so used to reading and writing, every day, several times a day, even more than one document at a time that we rarely stop to consider words, logos, brands and all the individual parts. This is what has guided us during an important process to register our brand, safeguard one of the WWG resources and continuously improve brand identity
What does registered brand mean?
The “r” that for a few days now stands beside the WWG brand on social media, on the website and on our other official communications indicates that our brand has been registered. The registration was successfully completed after a fairly complex verification process. WWG, however, thanks to the acronym , now has the highest degree of legal protection.
Why did we think it was imperative that we get this and have a registered trademark? We believe so much in our way of working that by protecting the brand we are certain to also protect some ideas.
Why trademark protection?
The law provides that you can use the registered trademark “r” only when you have obtained the certificate of registration.Therefore, only those who have passed the examination of the competent office and are in possession of the document certifying the ownership of the trademark can use the symbol® .
Beyond the procedure to be followed to register its brand, WWG with this choice seeks to avoid the risk of brand manipulation and at the same time intends to transmit to customers, potential and not, the partners and suppliers that the company has invested on its brand, ensuring that it is protected as an exclusive right.
Which are the advantages of the registered trademark?
We cannot say exactly which and how many characters, or fonts, have been made only today in relation to companies, startups, associations or working groups. In employing writing, or bending it to a need of communication, often its origin is lost or its privilege is underestimated: this ability to transform an oral knowledge, an immaterial content, into something more solid even if equally fluctuating. Nothing seems more definite and conclusive than putting black on white. Or, as we shall see, red on purple.
We want to use the brand now. Not everyone knows that, from the moment a trademark is registered, the owner has a duty to respect, on pain of the risk of having the sign deleted from the registers: it is the burden of use.
With its own brand, WWG does not want to emphasize its activities, “decorate” the work done with its customers. The potential customers who are in front of our brand, and in general many who have never heard of WWG, are like fishermen sitting on the bank of a river.They try to fish, among many phrases, images, icons, something that makes sense, both reassuring and telling a story. The right story attracts the right people in the midst of so many wrong stories. It is necessary to justify your own strong presence among so many. So it sometimes comes to wonder if the signs with which the brands are made can stand out or do not contribute, in spite of themselves, to increase the background noise.
The buzz too often prevents the recognition of the right sounds. For this it is worth sharing some information on how the registered trademark of the software house WWG was born.
WWG’s history
Applying a ® everywhere (on the site, on information materials, brochures, promotional materials…) you choose to tell the story of our brand: because we have chosen a name and what values it refers to.
Never before has the principle of “less is more” been placed as the founding principle of WWG communication. After 20 years of activity in the IT sector, it seemed like the right way to rethink our communication.
Choice of colors: purple and red
In the novel The Purple Color, Alice Walker invents a character who at first is a bit superficial, but as time goes by she develops a truly admirable attention and depth. So much so that one of his thoughts offers the starting point for the title: «I believe that God is angry if, for example, one passes close to the purple color in a field without noticing it». For Shug, purple is the proof of glory and a kind of generosity that comes from above.
The history of colors gives many proofs: purple is a very important color. In the spectrum of colors it is positioned between purple, a sign of wealth and high social status, and mauve, a sort of artificial chemical coloring that in the nineteenth century had as its goal to transform the purple in a more democratic and popular color. So purple is a color that unites after splitting. Its power is well represented by these two shades, one very old and one very recent.
Purple has a special status in different cultures and contexts. It is for example one of the main liturgical colors of Catholicism and since in the Middle Ages during Lent shows were forbidden, among the Italian theater is still a taboo tint, a color with strange powers. Also on the other side of the world, in Japan, the Miurasaki was a type of intense violet considered kin-Jiki, that is a forbidden colour, forbidden to ordinary people.
Everyone is drawn to the other color of WWG instead. Hard not to choose red. Man has used it since the 6th and 4th millennium B.C. The Egyptians wrapped their loved ones in shrouds dyed with hematite. The Romans extracted from the cochineal the red with which they decorated the uniforms reserved for generals.
Many experiments are done every day by inserting red in communications of all kinds: uniforms, billboards, icons, backgrounds etc. Until the Renaissance, inserting a red-haired woman in a painting meant inserting a talisman, a magical element in your design.
Red makes you think of power, sensuality, but also responsibility. It is still not really clear today why Enzo Ferrari, at a certain point, chose the red for his fast cars, but one thing is certain: when you think of a Ferrari the mind immediately goes to a cheeky tone, brave and with an extra gear.
The lines of the WWG brand
In the brand new registered logo, consisting of flat letters, sharp lines are evident to indicate a direct path, quick and without shortcuts. The line chosen for the WWG brand as a trajectory that proceeds inexorably towards the end, the last letter. A line that “enjoys” the journey in its entirety accepting its own destiny, goes inexorably, embracing the unknown with curiosity and enthusiasm.
The WWG logo, overturning, playing and experimenting, becomes the number 33. Two digits that in numerology have a really intriguing meaning. It is a master number, such as 11 and 22. For some, 33 accompanies a spiritual awakening by bringing light into the dark zones of oneself. For numerology the 33 requires a certain degree of responsibility to the wearer, or chooses it because it must be considered a lit lantern. The right tool for those who want to take a new look at the peaks of the unexplored.
Values
Here are the values we worked on to build the WWG brand:
Be small, be quick, think big
It’s a strong choice to stay small. Even when you’re getting bigger. It means living every day with the enthusiasm of the origins, not losing the frenzy you have when your idea becomes something concrete. Did it ever occur to you that startups, other than a type of company, could be a mindset? We wanted the WWG brand to transmit at least a little bit of a power that we believe in. An element that successful men and children have: the magic of imagination.
It really takes a lot of imagination today to solve problems, save your business projects and continually update your work team. We tried to lead the design team towards this idea of improvement that starts small and sometimes wants to stay that way.
The trademark WWG wants to make it clear how the WWG working group works: proudly small, combative, creative and in opposition to the dominant thinking.Sometimes you need to break away from a majority to keep yourself small, free and independent.
“We’ve always done that” is a phrase we don’t like. On the contrary, diversity can help to understand the complexity of the world in which we live and educate new and old generations – the professionals with whom we confront ourselves every day – to that dialogue which is the only reasonable prospect for planning for the future.
Comparison makes you grow. Growth translates into that dynamism that we believe is present in the studies done on our brand by our creative team.
