Hi all!
I've been giving you a fair bit of stick on Twitter recently about MFC merchandise (my handle is, ahem, @jmac). I mostly try and keep it light-hearted/civil, but every now and then I get a bit... ranty. And sweary. At the suggestion of the inimitable @demonblog, I decided to gather my thoughts and words from the gutter and try and give some more constructive criticism. If you're still reading at this point, thanks for indulging me.
You see—and I'm sure everyone who writes to you to complain says this—I love the Melbourne Football Club. I haven't been a member for as long as some, but I've followed the club since I was born. My Dad barracks for the Dees, and so do my two brothers and sister. My son Angus does now too, and with any luck so will his sister, Zara. Angus has been a member since he was born, and I'm hoping to sign 6 month-old Zara up this year too. My Dad is lucky enough to have seen the club win a Grand Final back in the day – in fact, had we not won the '64 GF, I might've been a Collingwood supporter like my grandfather and mother. Dodged a bullet there.
Anyway, the point of the email is this: in my opinion, Demons merchandise is terrible. Incredibly, shamefully, cringe-worthily bad. It's not just a bit average, or so-bad-it's-good, or even boring. I could deal with any of those; most merchandise is not great. But ours is quantifiably abysmal. I'm not sure who is to blame -- I certainly hope I'm not bad-mouthing some dedicated and dutiful volunteer. But if you are paying someone to concept and design this stuff, you need to stop and find someone else, fast.
Take this beanie. I understand the intent: you want to make a beanie that looks like the ones we used to wear back in the day. But instead of making a faithful replica, this design says "vintage" on it. VINTAGE. That's kind of like getting an elderly person and writing "OLD" on their forehead in permanent marker. Like the pompom and chunky knit didn't give that away already? And what is with that font? Completely inappropriate. None of it makes any sense, and so it is awful. Wouldn't wear it if you were giving them away, sorry. How would I make it better? Lose all text, emphasise the demon illustration on the patch, and done. Simple. Was bad, is now acceptable.
What about this watch. Apart from looking terrible on the website (the image is stretched almost beyond recognition) — really? That logo on a cheap-looking Citizen knockoff? Apart from not having any info on what it is you're selling on that page, this is just a terrible idea. Again, I understand the intent: you want to sell something at low cost with high markup. Solid plan, can't fault it. But this looks like something you'd find in a plastic egg in one of those $2 toy dispensers. And you don't do anything to make it seem anything better than that by stretching the image and giving no context.
I could name another dozen instances of extreme ugliness on the shop, but I'll leave it there.
At a higher level, there's this damned logo. Please, please drop it. Kill it with fire. Cut your losses. It's a kitchen sink, a designed-in-a-boardroom nightmare of a thing. It looks bad everywhere. The lettering is terrible. The entire idea behind it stinks. Whoever assembled it is a saint for attempting to thoughtfully cram 8,000 elements of face-palming obviousness into a single design, but that doesn't make it work. We are lucky to have a generally high standard of graphic design (and graphic designers) here in Melbourne -- you should engage with that community to come up with something better, something timeless, as our heritage demands. Christ, as we demand. Just use the MFC insignia for now and start looking for designers to come up with something that can help us supporters get behind the club while we rebuild, rather than be reminded of the horrors of the immediately pre-Roos era.
I wouldn't want a professional sporting team to look like some backwater amateur club. We should demand higher standards in how we present our team. Look to Manchester United or Arsenal, or any American sporting team (pro or amateur) for inspiration on this. There's a reason we 30-something-year-old dorks keep buying team merch from overseas -- it's good-looking stuff. It's aspirational, it's generally high quality, and it's well designed. I want to support the Demons in every way I can, and I'd actually buy and wear Melbourne stuff if it was anything close to acceptable. And how's this: Freo are doing a better job of their merch than we are. FREMANTLE. Their technicolour yawn of a brand is producing better gear than our steeped-in-history blue-blooded traditionalist team. What a travesty.
The club is clearly rejuvenated with the arrival of dual patron saints Peter Jackson and Paul Roosy Roos. We're all very excited about this, after aeons of profound heartbreak. But despite potential improvements in the football department, you shouldn't allow the rot to sit in any areas of business. There's no accounting for taste, sure, and I'm certain you've sold enough of this garbage that whoever is designing it can at least justify their employment (I hope). But don't you want MFC to be better than that? No one wants to barrack for Melbourne when supporters look like shopping centre bargain-bin dregs. We need people to be envious of us, to want what we have, in order to draw more people to us.
Actually, here's something positive (how refreshing, John) -- the new training tops with the large MFC insignia are fantastic. A real step in the right direction. I'll even forgive the AHG logo overlapping the insignia.
I obviously feel really strongly about this, and if you'd ever like to chat about it (haha!) feel free to get in touch. I'm a graphic/web designer and have been working with all sorts of Melbourne-based institutions for a long time, which is part of why I feel this passionate. I want to be proud of and excited by the Demons again; I want to not expect disappointment and mediocrity by default. And I want to wear a good hat/tshirt/scarf/anything to games. Please!
Thanks for your time!
Cheers,
John McLennan @jmac / john@......com