Rolling Stone Magazine Covers “The Brand”

By Andrew | January 6th, 2009 Graphic Design 14 Comments
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    • So mentioned in yesterday’s post I have put together a 3 post series of Rolling Stone Magazine Covers.

    Here lies the first post, which displays the vast evolution of the brand, and how it has been used and displayed.

    Now every “brand guru” preaches that it is vital to keep consistent with your brand image and design. This is to ensure maximum impact and ‘stickiness’ to remain in the desired target audience’s mind. Rolling Stone has done things a little differently, almost right from the start. As you look through this image set it is evident that the title font has changed a few times since the 1970′s. This isn’t totally uncommon with a brand, as it is sometimes done to coincide with a directional change. ( in this case from a political content based magazine into a pop culture resource)

    One fascinating change that occurs is that they move the logo around the top of the cover page. Sometimes it is aligned right to the top, other times it is underneath a headline. The most interesting change that takes place throughout these magazine covers is that Rolling Stone often (especially in the newer editions) covers up part of their logo, at times almost ALL of their brand. This demonstrates the astounding strength of the brand. They are able to reveal a small piece of their logo, yet the consumer still knows exactly what magazine it is.

    So browse these covers and notice the change in the Rolling Stone title brand image. They are a great example of something I like to call ‘Brand Consistency Evolution’.

    **Coming up next in Part 2 of this 3 post series is the power of the Rolling Stone Magazine Cover, and how they push limits and create iconic magazine covers.**

    Andrew.

    Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand

    Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand Rolling Stone Mag Brand

    All images courtesy of www.rollingstone.com

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    • About the Author: Andrew Dertinger

    Andrew has been brought on board to help out with the creative quality of Inspiredology. Andrew brings his experience in branding and marketing.

    Andrew Dertinger has written 69 articles for Inspiredology.
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    • Alex Charchar
      January 6, 2009 at 7:32 pm

      Nice collection of covers, thanks for sharing :)

      one of the really intersting changes made is the ever-so-slight tweak they did sometime around the 10th year (I don’t know exactly when it was, just going off the shots above)..

      On the 10th anniversary edition (and the one to its right), and the ones below it, the slight redrawing of all the letters, with the R extending to below the O being the most extreme, rather than just dropping slightly below the baseline..

      these kind of slight tweaks are often nice changes s they show that those behind them care enough about the brand to not throw it out completely, but just make the small improvements that may be needed..

    • ustunuzum
      February 2, 2009 at 10:51 pm

      http://tinyurl.com/8hbxqz

      best rolling stone magazine covers

    • gunter
      February 5, 2009 at 4:09 pm

      {design inspiration} Rolling Stone magazine covers – http://tinyurl.com/8hbxqz

    • rothlin
      February 6, 2009 at 7:39 pm

      las mejores portadas de la revista rolling stone…
      http://tinyurl.com/8hbxqz

    • Nancy
      March 28, 2009 at 9:01 pm

      Been researching Rolling Stone a lot in the past week or so (writing a paper on their brand) and those small tweaks in the early 80s, I believe, were actually suggested to Wenner by Mick Jagger. He told Wenner they had lost something with the change in the logo and basically told him to “put the balls back on.” :)

    • Yamila M.
      May 14, 2009 at 2:02 pm

      Rolling Stone Magazine covers: Which one do you like the most? http://bit.ly/hkOvm

    • ¿Como te llamas?
      October 6, 2009 at 5:34 pm

      GRANDES CAPAS DA #rollingstone http://bit.ly/12SJGA

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