Life on Campus at NC State: NC State's Brand...What Is it?

Bill O’Donnell -

I’ve long been critical of how NC State brands itself with wordmarks and logos both at the overall university level and at the athletics department level. Some moves, like making the Tuffy head the main athletics logo, have been great. Other moves, like replacing the classic University seal with something that looks more befitting of a private elementary school, have been less than great.

However, it wasn't until I saw the release of a Homefield "1960s Logo Coaches Jacket" that featured a logo that was introduced in 2005 (that's 36 years after the end of the 1960s for those that are counting) that made me want to put together some words on this.

Jacket from Homefield

Full disclosure - I really like the jacket shown above. But if you're going as far with the retro aesthetic to name the item a "1960s" coaches jacket, why not use a logo from...the 1960s?

Over the last 7-8 years, NC State has made some decisions that have resulted in the University being branded in an incredibly restrictive manner. In looking at the University's branding/logo webpage and the trademark licensing webpage, these are a few examples of limitations they've imposed:

  • Wordmarks: "State", "NCSU", and "North Carolina State" cannot be used on any official University merchandise or materials, only "NC State";
  • Primary Logos: The strutting wolf, Tuffy head, and Block S logos introduced in the 2000s are the only "spirit logos" that can be freely used by merchandisers;
  • University Seal: NCSU swapped out the University Commercial Seal for the newer University Hallmark (it's still beyond me why we made something that looks like it's straight from a Junior Wolfpack Club coloring book an official insignia for the University);
  • Pack vs. 'Pack: The use of "Pack" is not allowed. Instead, merchandisers must include an apostrophe before the word - 'Pack (insert eye roll here); and
  • Vintage Logos: The only throwback or vintage logos that merchandisers are allowed to use are the "Ticket Stub Block S" and "Hungry Wolf" (otherwise known as the Slobbering Wolf). Use of either logo also requires the inclusion of a Wolfpack Almanac Collection logo, which just unnecessarily crowds the design of any such merchandise.

I completely understand the benefits of having a clean, organized, and consistent branding message. If the University wanted to be exclusively referred to externally as "NC State" on its website or in official University marketing materials, then that makes total sense (although the official URL & domain name for the University still being "NCSU" seems to work directly against what they've tried to do).

What I do not understand, though, is why we extend such extreme branding restrictions across our own alumni, fanbase, and student body. It totally stifles all creativity and results in a lot of merchandise looking indistinguishable from one item to the next, and from brand to brand, with each passing year.

Wordmarks:

People in North Carolina are always going to refer to the University and its athletic programs as "NC State", "State", "NCSU" - and even "North Carolina State" (hello Dan Bonner). NC State's fans and alumni are the individuals who buy the merchandise sold at places like the Campus Bookstore and Red & White Shop - and I'm pretty certain that "State" is how the vast majority of fans & alumni refer to the University in their everyday conversations.

WCU Game from September 2024

The athletics department used "State" on the MBB jerseys across only two seasons in recent memory: 2011-2012 and 2012-2013. After that, we reverted back to "NC State" on the uniforms - aside from the vintage "State" jerseys worn in the annual Heritage Classic game at Reynolds Coliseum (these are by far the best jerseys we have in any sport). The reason given for the switch back to "NC State" was that the University didn't want the people watching the games to be confused as to which "State" was playing (although that's never seemed to be an issue for Mississippi State, Michigan State, etc.).

However, if the MBB team were to wear the white "State" jerseys for all home games, I don't see how anyone watching could miss the fact that the team playing is NC State. The broadcast score bug would say "NC State", everything would be in red/white coloring, "Wolfpack" and "NC State" would be seen written across the baselines/sidelines, and there would be a MASSIVE Tuffy head at center court that takes up half the TV screen.

Plenty of people refer to NC State University in a variety of ways. Why not allow merchandisers to feature designs that refer to the University in a way other than "NC State"? If I walked into the Lenovo Center this winter and was able to buy a red & white sweatshirt that simply said "State" on it, would it really damage the brand?

Logos:

Back in 2021, when I wrote about NC State's swap of the University's Commercial Seal for the University Hallmark, I first posted a Twitter poll that had the following results:

What's the Deal with the NCSU Seal

That poll was up for 24 hours, garnered 402 votes, and ended in 93% favor of the Commercial Seal's design. At the time, I shared that poll with the Trademark Licensing Department, but got a less-than-receptive response. To me, this begged the question: If you're not going to listen to feedback from your fanbase & alumni - then who are you even making these branding, trademark, and licensing decisions for? I think it also says a lot that when Adidas added the Bellower to the crest on the neckline of the football jerseys in 2023, they opted to use the classic University Seal logo rather than the newer Hallmark.

When it comes to other vintage logos, NC State does not allow the use of any of the following on merchandise:

In order to use one of the above vintage logos, you would have to do the following:

Vintage Marks Restrictions

So, in any circumstance where a merchandiser wants to use a vintage logo other than the two that are freely allowed, they wouldn't be able to unless they could prove out the appropriateness of the inclusion of one of these other logos in the context of some kind of special event or anniversary. How many merchandisers are going to take the time to do that for a single university that they have no affiliation with other than a business relationship?

Even when it comes to positive logo changes that NCSU has made in recent years, we didn't move to using the current Tuffy Head instead of the Block S for athletics until Syracuse joined the ACC and had a similar Block S logo to ours. It also took years of the fanbase clamoring for more of the Slobbering Wolf logo before that finally happened.

However - because we've been so aggressively limiting the use of other logos and wordmarks - many of the "vintage" merchandise items look like carbon copies of one other. Take, for example, the Vintage Collection page at the Red & White Shop. I love the Red & White Shop - it's alumni-owned, located in the Ridgewood Shopping Center near campus, and has more State merchandise than anywhere else in the Triangle (I'd really like to see them open a second location on Hillsborough St). But if you looked at that Vintage Collection page at the time I wrote this, it included a total of 98 items. Of those items, only 4 of them do not feature the Slobbering Wolf. That means that 95%+ of the vintage State merchandise on the market features the exact same logo from item to item.

The Slobbering Wolf is my favorite State logo; I wish it were at center court at the Lenovo Center. But why does NCSU have to be so bland in making retailers keep slapping the same few logos on everything? Even with the retro football jerseys released this year, we took the original throwback Tuffy head logo that was on the shoulders of those uniforms and replaced it with the Slobbering Wolf.

I'm not naïve enough to think that the Trademark Licensing Department is just going to reverse course overnight after years of pushing these changes. But I do think that NCSU using a custom embroidery model like Peter Millar does for their collegiate merchandise would help to provide the fanbase with more options. If you purchase a collegiate item from Peter Millar, that item is specifically stitched for your order. This helps them manage the front-end supply chain/inventory and also reduces their exposure on the back end, given that any such custom embroidered items cannot be returned. Along those same lines, the next time the University wants to sell a new sweatshirt in the bookstore that has "NC State" across the chest, why not offer an option where fans could have theirs read "State" or "NCSU" instead?

IcePack:

Another instance of how strictly NC State enforces its branding across its own fanbase, alumni, and students was when the IcePack club hockey team played UNC-CH's club hockey team at Carter-Finley Stadium in "Frozen Finley" as one of the events surrounding the Carolina Hurricanes' Stadium Series game in February 2023.

NC State's club hockey team cannot refer to itself as "NC State" or the "Wolfpack" on its jerseys. That's where the "IcePack" name comes from.

The one exception to this was during the festivities around the Stadium Series weekend, where the club team was allowed to use "NC State" on their jerseys for the event. Therefore, because it benefitted NC State from a branding perspective, NC State allowed the students on that club team to associate themselves directly with the University. In every other circumstance, they cannot - it has to be IcePack.

However, in a very NC State-branding move, when these black club hockey jerseys went on sale to the public, the word mark had to be flipped back from "NC State" to "IcePack".

In contrast to NCSU's mandates, UNC-CH's club hockey team has consistently been allowed to wear jerseys with official university logos on them. However, to top it off for that Stadium Series weekend, UNC-CH's club team wore new jerseys for the event that featured their university's seal. This is the same type of logo that NC State once allowed to be used, but later scrubbed from all merchandise in 2018 in favor of the Hallmark.

In a move that I wish NC State would take notice of, earlier this year the Carolina Hurricanes launched a “Caniac Connect” program where they actually solicited feedback from their fans (gasp!) on things like logos, merchandise, concessions, parking prices, transportation options to/from games, etc. This is in direct opposition to how NC State communicates in most instances with its fans and alumni.

Merchandise:

Another example of these branding decisions is exhibited with Homefield's merchandise. Homefield specializes in vintage merch releases for a number of universities. I loved the first NC State/Homefield release back in 2022 and am pretty certain I bought damn near every item from that initial drop. This release included a number of items that featured certain State logos I haven't seen anywhere else outside of Ebay and thrift markets.

Homefield

Everything from Homefield is great quality and many of their offerings represent some of the more creative NC State items I've seen in years. But with each successive release in the NC State Homefield line, we've gotten items that feature Homefield-created NC State logos and other items that look like something that could've been found at the Western Blvd K-Mart in 2010.

IMO, if Homefield released a white shirt that just said “State” or “NCSU” across the chest in red lettering, or used a design that featured something like the Diamond S (or the so bad, it's now "good" drowning rats logo from the 90s), the entire stock of shirts would sell out in a matter of hours.

Compare what is available on Homefield's website for NC State to UNC-Chapel Hill’s Homefield line. I couldn't spend too long looking at that UNC-CH page because the color made me want to vom, but I counted at least 8 distinct logos from UNC-Chapel Hill's history before I had to tap out and close the Chrome tab. You can also compare what is available for our Wolfpack to the other Wolf Pack’s Homefield line. The Nevada Wolf Pack's recent releases have also been more creative than the NC State one, even though their line features a fraction of the number of items. For instance, take Nevada's simple “Pack” hoodie, change the primary color to red, and that's in my closet tomorrow. Although, NC State would make Homefield add an apostrophe before “Pack” because of #branding.

NC State is obviously something I'm passionate about on a variety of fronts, and it's incredibly frustrating to me when I feel like we're our own worst enemy in this regard. I'm sure with their opposing viewpoint, the Trademark Licensing Department would point to increased sales for certain items & product lines subsequent to the implementation of their branding changes, ignoring that there are other factors driving sales (like finally adding college-specific shirts to the bookstore, the NCSU athletics department going to two Final Fours in a single year & two of the last four College World Series, etc.).

Specific to those athletic achievements mentioned above - it felt ridiculous to me back in March that NC State won an ACC Men's Basketball Title for the first time in the lifespan of any fan under the age of 37 and the Trademark Licensing Department celebrated by posting paragraphs on its social media outlets about the dangers of unlicensed merchandise.

Zoom and Enhance at Your Own Peril

Their messaging somehow always manages to feel incredibly over the top and out of touch.

Having had conversations with individuals involved with different retailers and merchandisers about these topics, it's clear they've run into their own obstacles in getting designs approved for various items. Again - if you're not going to listen to the viewpoints of your fans, alumni, students, or even those making the merchandise - who are you trying to please by being so limiting and prohibitive with the University's wordmarks and logos?

If you want to cut down on people buying merchandise from unlicensed retailers, then maybe make it easier for the licensed retailers to use more than the same few NC State wordmarks & logos that everyone has been forced into using for years now. If merchandise from outlets like Vintage Brand looks better and/or more creative than what you can find on sale in the campus bookstore from licensed retailers, then people are only going to keep buying merchandise from those other sources.

Go Pack.