AJC February 21st 1992

 The Atlanta Centennial Torch has created a little heat among local designers who feel scorched because Olympics officials turned to out-of-town talent to produce the new logo.

"They used Atlanta and the reputation of the South to bring the Games here, and now they are giving all the work to outside people," complained Deborah W. Bruker, president of The Bruker Group, an Atlanta design firm. "We, at least, deserved an opportunity to have a fair shot at it."

The grumbling over the logo, the product of San Francisco-based Landor Associates, represents a nagging conflict likely to flare up every time the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG) spends a dime: How much should remain in Atlanta?

After hearing promises of a $4 billion economic windfall, virtually every business in town is waiting for the Olympic spending to begin.

And many small companies--struggling to make it on a national playing field--had been counting on hitching up to the Olympic gravy train and traveling to the Big Time.

Instead, they're beginning to see contracts go to "outsiders," although ACOG continues to solicit local ad agencies, public relations firms and the like for pro bono assignments.

Many in the arts community grumbled when ACOG hired Jeffrey N. Babcock to direct the Cultural Olympiad. Founder and president of the Miami-based New World Symphony, Dr. Babcock was, as one branded him, "a non-resident Yankee."

And they worry that non-resident composers, artists and musicians will be hired to interpret the "American South" on the cultural platform--ACOG is going to California to audition singers and dancers for its extravaganza at the closing ceremony of the Barcelona Games.

Yet, the largest contract awarded yet by ACOG has gone to an Atlanta joint venture, Sizemore Floyd Ingram, which was selected to develop the design framework for the $500 million Olympic construction program and to act as consultant.

Don Trousdell of Atlanta's Trousdell Design hopes the logo decision doesn't portend a trend leading out of town. "But like all corporations, and we're dealing with a huge corporation here, they feel safety with the big names."

In the graphic design industry, Landor is one of the biggest and the best with an unparalleled international network. It's recognized for image work for the likes of Coca-Cola, Hyatt Hotels, McDonald's and many of the world's leading airlines.

And most Atlanta design firms can't even snag a courtesy interview with the city's own Fortune 500 corporations, much less bid on projects beyond the freelance level, admits one designer.

"I think we have a lot more talent in this city than the Olympic committee has credited us with," says Barbara Cohen, head of Cohen & Co., an Atlanta corporate identity firm. "It certainly would have been a better idea and more in the spirit of the Olympics to have first tried the Atlanta design community."

Indeed, the Atlanta Chapter of the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA) prepared last June an Olympics directory, specifically for ACOG, identifying some 52 members capable of producing logos, brochures, posters, packaging and the like.

The AIGA asked for a meeting with the committee in December, and repeated that request late last week. ACOG has yet to set a date. "My concern is that the Atlanta design community has a chance to get in the door," said AIGA President Maxey Andress.

Ginger Watkins, ACOG executive vice president, said Landor was recommended by the committee's internal communications advisory group headed up by Bob Cohn, chairman of Atlanta's big Cohn & Wolfe public relations firm. His firm, incidently, represents Coca-Cola, one of Landor's biggest clients.

And that recommendation came only after Atlantan Brad Copeland, who designed the original five-A's bid logo, exhausted attempts to incorporate the all important centennial theme.

Ms. Watkins expected "questions" from the local design community when Landor's involvement was revealed and moved quickly to soften the blow.

Once Landor came up with the Centennial Torch, ACOG oversaw the formation of a partnership including Landor and two Atlanta design firms--Copeland Designs and minority-owned Murrell Design Group.

The partnership helped refine and create the color palette for the logo and now is working on a graphics standards manual and applications of the logo on stationery, banners, folders and merchandise.

And when ACOG unveiled the new logo to the public last week the committee hosted a hastily arranged reception for the creative community.

Ms. Watkins, ACOG's chief of staff, said the reception was designed to address their concerns. "Anytime we would contract or go outside of the local community, we want the community to understand how it is not taking away from their participation in the Games," she said.

There is still plenty of graphic and communications work left for Atlanta firms, she said. Over the next four years, the committee will develop some 500 different publications, as well as banners, flags, T-shirts and promotional programs for the region.

"This is only the foundation from which all the other work can be done," she said.

Still, some Atlanta designers say the selection of Landor to provide the foundation will brand the local design community as second-rate and cripple its members' national marketing efforts for years to come.

"The ramifications to most Atlanta designers who do nationally prominent work and those who aspire to such are deeply harmful," said Ms. Bruker, who counts MARTA, Apple Computer and BellSouth Services among her clients, "at a level severe enough to consider relocation to avoid the tar brush."