A new era: MLS taps CCAD design alum to revamp team logo

Twenty years after the original logo was born, CCAD design alumnus Will Bennett (Advertising & Graphic Design, 1997) is helping usher in a new era for one of Major League Soccer's leading teams.

When the Columbus Crew surveyed fans in 2012, they were hit with a hard reality—their demographic was changing. Millenials were beginning to pack their stands. The team's owner, Anthony Precourt, who took over in 2013, knew the brand wasn't going to keep and immediately set out to change the face of the team, starting with a new logo.

"This isn't just changing a crest for us, it's a changing of our internal and external mission statement and what we stand for as the club," Precourt told MLSsoccer.com. "It's our values, and it's how we're going to conduct ourselves in terms of being ambassadors and living the brand on and off the field day-in and day-out."

Bennett, the Crew's director of creative services, teamed with Eric Sinicki, creative service coordinator, to create a fan-centric emblem (sans the construction workers of the original "Crew") that would reflect the team's past and represent its future.

The circular badge is a nod to traditional German soccer club badges and represents Columbus' German heritage, while the stripes and checkerboard patterns represent the other charter clubs in the league and the Crew's loyal fan base, respectively.

"We’ve created something that’s going to be the identifiable symbol of our club,” Bennett told Columbus Alive. “There’s an amazing amount of pride to be able to do something like this in a city I was born and raised in."