Manual for Corporate Identity
"Corporate Identity", "Corporate Communication", "Corporate Design", "House Style" - these terms complement as well as overlap each other. It remains so that the corporate identity of a company makes a major contribution to how the public sees that company. It can thus create an essential added value. This is extremely important in an age characterised by the sameness of products and quality. To concentrate on corporate identity means to concentrate on a company's market value. So it is hardly surprising that the authors took up the challenge to produce a book that would undoubtedly prove a talking point in this area. 'The Image of a Company' should certainly contribute to the ideas about, and evaluation of, corporate identity.
'The Image of a Company' is not a dusty reference book. It begins with two essays on the subject: An art-historical and cultural vision by Paul Hefting on corporate identity from past to present, and the detailed know-how of F.H.K. Henrion, based on his long experience in well-known corporate identity and design programs.
A large section of the book discusses how various world companies built up their corporate identities: Braun, The Royal PTT Netherlands, The London Underground, Adidas, Coca-Cola, Erco, Esprit, IBM, KLM, Kodak and Volkswagen.
Then the practical art of the book starts with an essay by Alex Visser on the organisation of a corporate identity program, followed by a sixty-page section in which the complete housestyle of an imaginary new company called "Image" is presented down to the last detail: a corporate identity manual by Cees de Jong and Ernst Schilp (V & K Design) and Ben Bos.
