If you’ve missed any part of our in-depth series on Tradition vs Future so far, feel free to check up on them.
Tradition vs Future
Tradition – The White Out
Tradition – Jersey Numbers
Tradition – Colors and Logo
Tradition – Passion
Tradition – Losing
Future – St. John’s
Future – Core Players
Future – Team Brand
We touched on the tradition of the Team Colours, today we will look at the future. The new Jets look has been criticized left right and centre from being to plain, to being ugly, to being a rip off and to being too military.
The new brand is definitely military themed but in my opinion that makes perfect sense. When you look at why Winnipeg was originally called the Jets it was because of a strong heritage to the Winnipeg Air Force base. Now while the original incarnation was simple in design and didn’t embrace that military aspect it makes perfect sense to do so now.
The most recent look of the Vancouver Canucks has embraced the heritage of what being a Canuck on the west coast is about. They’ve used the native artwork to recreate their logo. It’s not a necessary step to be that true to the source for the name but for True North it made sense and going forward it’s the brand we are going to have to get behind.
The logo of course has been talked about in detail and we all know that the original source was the Air Force Roundel. The brand release package that Rebook did for the logo launch gave us a glimpse of where the future will lie with this look. Gone is the red, lets let it go. It’ll be in the logo only of the maple leaf and that’s it.
Our team colors are the two tones of blue, two shades of grey/silver and white. Jersey concepts have popped up everywhere including counterfeit jerseys already in the market. There is as much or more anticipation for the official jerseys to come out and while we’ll speculate that these will have a very military feel to them, until they are released all we can do is speculate.
For now we know that the Jets look of old is gone, it’ll take some time for traditionalists to embrace the new look but it’s something we should accept and embrace. In the traditional aspect we showed how some teams try a new look then end up reverting back. Do not count on that happening in Winnipeg.
This is a new franchise with only emotional ties to the original Jets and that’s it. Don’t expect to see a retro jersey unless the Jets get selected to play in a Heritage or Winter Classic. The third jersey for the Jets will not be like the old Jets jersey. This is a new team and new brand and True North is likely to keep this brand and look for many, many years to come.
True North knows the value of brand recognition and they will follow in the footsteps of the teams like the Red Wings, Bruins and Flyers that will tweak but never stray from the original logo. The future will dictate how the brand develops but I would suggest to Jets fans that they get used to the new look because it’s not going anywhere unless the team does and none of us want that to happen again.
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