United States Postal Service—redesigning an american institution (grand-army.com)
over 9 years ago from Matt Achariam, Intent Renderer
over 9 years ago from Matt Achariam, Intent Renderer
THIS IS GREAT. THANK YOU FOR POSTING.
I see what you did there...
First thing I felt as well. Found it quite intense! It's almost the polar opposite to the mail service here in Ireland.
CRUISE CONTROL TO AWESOME
This takes all-caps to a whole new level. Maybe using some lowercase letters might help here? It feels like the post office is yelling at me :-/
Don't get me wrong, it's beautiful, but not as friendly as it could be.
I think that is my biggest problem with the design. I love the aesthetic of it, but from a functionality standpoint I can't really parse through all of that information. My head hurts just scanning through the shipping labels and I have to slowly read through it.
In my opinion, the design problem that needs solving most with USPS isn't how their menus look in post offices, but rather the experience itself of mailing something. Most importantly, making it easier to answer the question: how much will it cost to ship this thing?
The design linked here is overwhelming because the options available are overwhelming...
I think everyone agrees that the USPS has a systemic problem, but what we're addressing here is the design to that problem. Does this design improve the problem or does it make it worse? Are we trying to solve the problem or are we just making the problem look pretty? Your question is spot on about the experience of shipping something and I believe that our jobs as designers should be to constantly ask ourselves those types of questions.
Ya, the all-caps is really bothering me. Also there are a lot of instance where the leading is bad. Especially when there are line-dividers present.
The color scheme is nice, though.
Have you ever been to a friendly post office? :)
Thought this was a student redesign project.
This reminds me:
If I encounter another PSD (or whatever else) where someone types stuff in all caps, and I can't turn it off with this button, I will personally drop by and slap you in the face. With a stapler. Twice.
Thanks for your cooperation.
I like most of the individual parts, but taken altogether, its visually too dense for me in terms of space and pieces of information. However, a lot of the other points are very nice.
For the most part though, you'll see these as individual parts and not all jammed together for a collage photograph for their portfolio.
I feel like it's shouting at me to be more American.
It's like The Colbert Report in print form.
WHAT IS CAPS LOCK?
I do really like the colors and esthetics of this - agreed that the all-caps is perhaps a bit too extensive.
However it would have been great to see how they would tackle some of the awful forms you have to fill out when shipping items.
This feels like a big step back from this: http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/new_packaging_for_usps_priority_mail.php#.U9kxEo1dXzc
That said I'd say design is pretty low on the list of reasons why the USPS sucks.
This is intense. Almost a bit scary.
This is REALLY nice.
Agreed! I like this a lot.
I always don't get redesigns of American governmental entities using nostalgic or retro imagery. Is it really wise, to make an American institution look forward by making it look backwards? I don't know.
You're gonna catch hate for posting any kind of redesign like this - anywhere. So expect the worse. But for real, you can't seriously put everything in all caps. That's not usable at all.
There's a very overused quote that makes a lot of sense here - especially for something like a redesign of the USPS - - - "Great design is invisible." People turn to the USPS to simply get something done and this is adding an extra headache.
No joke - this gave me a serious headache looking at it. Going the Post Office sucks. This would make it worse. I didn't think that was possible.
Brazil's mail service just had its brand redesigned and the difference is that the result was not good and also, it cost R$42 million (~U$20 million)
http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/new_logo_and_identity_for_correios_by_cda.php
Aesthetically pretty nice, but it’s so difficult to scan the text. The most dense areas of information being set in all-caps, condensed and with inverted text isn’t helping much. Huge step forward, regardless.
+1
I like the look & feel. Might be a bit screaming, but that is ok and can be adjusted easily.
However the visual style stands in the way of legibility and scanability. Good to see here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/7rolmqcffsxaovn/Screenshot%202014-07-30%2010.20.32.png
It should be all about information first, always.
Agree about information first.
Looking at that image specifically, decreasing the size of the X TO Y DAYS section labels would allow for more padding with the cells below them and would probably help a bit with the scanning problem.
Nice take on a modern USPS. Very patriotic. Gotham ftw. Now let's tackle the service...
Lovely aesthetic but terrible information design.
It's a shame as the real problem to solve here wasn't the visuals, palettes and typography, but the layout and presentation and information design.
This is a very good execution of a particular style. I think it would benefit from a little more typographic variation and a little less ornamental sugar. While it looks good right now, this is a style that can feel dated very quickly. Knowing how long a rebranding may stick on a government service, I think a little more timelessness would be a great idea.
Desperately needed! I hope their digital presence gets a make-over too.
Seems like they didn't consider the audience that well... probably mostly old people, who might have trouble scanning the reversed all caps.
I really like this redesign. I would have liked for them to have kept the eagle on some of the packaging, it is an excellent illustration.
I like this. Honestly there has to be some way to save the USPS because I really like their service and I much prefer it for packages over FedEx and UPS.
Fantastic work. I just wish the service was half as good as this redesign.
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