<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-402" title="happyhappy" src="/pullinc/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/happyhappy.gif" alt="happyhappy" width="500" height="464" />

Come on, get happy!  Seemingly in this sour economy we may be seeing an interesting trend in identity design– marketers want happy logos! The happiest of all is the fact that Wal-Mart had actually made an effort to copyright the iconic "smiley-face" as it's very own. Of course there is nothing wrong with putting a smile on things. Especially now when we could all use a lift.  I suppose if you are a consumer facing marketer, trying to own happiness as an attribute of your brand's identity might be a logical strategy... but is anybody buying it? In the Kraft example, this new identity was created for application to corporate communcations only, not product packaging. Which leads me to believe that the only people Kraft is really interested in making happy are shareholders not customers. Who knows? The observation is interesting nonetheless.

This kind of stuff comes and goes with the times and the whims of the folks in charge of brand building. In my opinion if you have to resort to putting a smile in your logo, you might have challenges smiley logos won't fix. Just a thought.