In April, Godrej Industries Group unveiled its refreshed brand identity, including a new identifier and a unifying purpose statement – ‘Crafting tomorrow since 1897’. The group, which has a 129-year legacy, also announced an ambitious target of reaching Rs 5 lakh crore market cap by 2031.

Pirojsha Godrej, chairperson-designate of the Godrej Industries Group, told a press conference on the occasion: “We believe reputation should be earned through performance.”

The Group said the new purpose and brand identity align its identity, strategy and ambition for its next phase of growth and business evolution.

The April 22 announcement came nearly two years after the conglomerate reached a family settlement and split into two entities, namely Godrej Industries Group and Godrej Enterprises Group.

Alongside the new unifying purpose for the Group whose portfolio spans consumer products, real estate, financial services, agriculture, and chemicals, the Godrej Industries Group also unveiled its new brand identity, introducing a new visual language, bespoke typography (GI Sans), a proprietary sonic identity, and a signature fragrance. The company said the new brand identity is aimed at creating a cohesive, multi-sensory expression across digital, physical and experiential touchpoints.

The refreshed brand identity has been crafted by DISCO, the in-house design team.

Tanya Dubash, Executive Director and Chief Brand Officer, Godrej Industries Group, said, “This refreshed brand identity reflects both who we are and where we are going. It reinforces the strength of the Godrej brand while creating a more contemporary and unified expression of our ambitions for tomorrow. It enables each of our businesses to connect more powerfully to a shared purpose while remaining true to their distinct roles.”

New identifier triggers ‘identical’ debate

While the Group unveiled its ambitions for the future, its rebranding also triggered a copyright debate after the new visual identity was found to be almost a copy of an independent Australian creative agency, Guerrilla.

The new ‘GI logo’ was also compared with other existing logos, like from iD Fresh and Interdiscount, and became a topic of debate on the social media.

The company was then forced to issue a clarification which addressed two key questions being asked: whether the new ‘GI’ identifier has replaced the legacy Godrej signature logo, and whether the design was nearly identical to several global corporate marks.

The Group said the widely-recognised Godrej signature logo remains intact and will continue to be the only logo used across all consumer-facing products and services.

“The Godrej signature continues to remain our logo and its usage on all our consumer-facing products and services remains entirely unchanged,” it clarified.

The company added that the ‘GI’ identifier is not a logo to be used at the consumer end but a group identifier to be used at the corporate level, representing the Godrej Industries Group. Its intended professional stakeholder audiences include investors, media, and talent.

The company asserted that the GI identifier would be used alongside the legacy Godrej signature logo or the company name.

It may be noted that the post the 2024 restructuring, the two business groups continue to function under the Godrej name and signature logo. This was cited among the reasons to come up with a new corporate identifier for the Godrej Industries Group.

How Godrej responded to criticism

As regards the ‘GI’ identifier being identical to other corporate logos, the fact which drew criticism from social media users and brand professionals, the company defended its new identity and said such similarities were common in minimalist, geometric brand designs.

“A half circle, rectangle and circle combination appears across dozens of identities in multiple countries and sectors,” the company said, adding the identifier was finalised from several options after an extensive design process that included intellectual property and legal diligence.

The finalised ‘GI’ identifier was selected as it sat well alongside the Godrej signature logo without visually competing with it, the company indicated.

“Having confirmed both the originality of the work and that our brand identity system is clearly distinct from any other brand, we concluded that there is no ethical or legal impediment to the use of the GI identifier,” a company spokesperson said in a statement.

While the Godrej Industries Group has emphatically defended its new corporate identifier and indicated full conviction to use it, it remains to be seen whether the new logo leads to second redesign and legal challenges.

The post Godrej’s ‘new identity’ gets entangled in ‘copy’ debate; company says similarities common in minimalist, geometric designs appeared first on India Communication Forum.