#1: We like the colors and font and the modern yet slightly exotic feel. The drawing of the boat is not sharp / clean enough though. Other ideas / avenues are welcome. One additional graphical element could be a shipping container (see "What We Do" and "Our Ideas and Additional Information" sections).

#3: We love the idea. Though the all brown color scheme is very classy, we'd love to see a try at exploring some color. Would be great to see some variations.

#2: sorry, not modern enough.

OK, 11:30 PM in France (5:30 PM EST)... off for the night. New entries will be checked in the morning.

CH, you can leave individual feedback by clicking on the image.

Regards,
LexLogo

#10: good job on the color, although the classy all-brown #3 still does look really great as well... a really close tie. We're not sure about the font though, specifically the font used for the word "IMPORT", and maybe no rounded rectangle background behind it.

#7 and #8: the boat looks good, nice clean vectorial drawing, and a clear pirate connotation. In #8, the boat is a bit small compared to the letters. In #7, the black for the boat is just a bit too much contrast, a dark brown woudl be better.

#6 is nice and simple, perhaps just a bit too much so...

@lexlogo: Yes, I know... but my partners are not too tech savvy and it's easier for them to see all the comments on one page. I'll try to use the individual comments more in the future.

Kind Regards,

-dniry

--

That found image does look just like it. My apologies. I simply used dingbats found within a pirate font I have. The dingbats were obviously taken from that image. I was not aware of this.

I just spoke to my partner. He suggested trying to use an actual shipping container instead of a crate or chest. See http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&q=shipping%20container

@jgoodew: no problem, these things happen. Too bad.. that ship looked good! ;-)

Just a thought, but you seem to lose the "pirate" feel with using an actual shipping container

@everyone: Many thanks for the entries. I'm unable to get a hold of my partner tonight, so I will rank and post comments in the morning after I speak to him. Sorry for the delay.

lexlogo - your entries should be 100% original - a dingbat is clipart, just in font form.

Good morning to all... Despite's lexlogo's suggestion to use the individual feedback (which I will once we get to more specific tweaking on individual designs), I think this round of entries is best commented using the general board.

Some of you may be surprised at the ranking here, so I will explain: for now the rank is more based on concept than overall graphical quality. So despite the fact that some designs clearly have a better rendering quality, they may be ranked behind other designs that are better matches in terms of concept.

I think at this point it is safe to say that we want the graphical element to be a container or crate with a pirate mark, or a pirate boat, or perhaps even some sort of "composed scene" such as a pirate boat at bay, with a few containers stacked in front. There was recently a contest for "Natalie's coffee". The winning design there may give you a rough idea of what I mean by "composed scene" (I hope I'm not breaking any client rules of conduct by quoting an example from another contest, but it's just to illustrate what I mean by "composed scene", mods: feel free to edit my post if it is indeed innapropriate for me to do this.)

I know we had included character / mascot as a possible logo type, but after speaking to my partner this morning, we decided against it after all. My apologies to the designers who took that path... I guess we just don't always know what we want until we start seeing stuff.

EDIT: we just got a couple more designs with the container idea, so the top 4 entries are now ranked based both on concept and overall perceived graphical quality.

UNRELATED TO CONTEST:

"And the whole world has to answer right now
Just to tell you once again who's bad!"

Rest In Peace Michael... People of all ages from all over the world will miss you. You went down like a true star: you managed to take twitter down for a few minutes !!

Nancy, I didn't use dingbats.. i know better... it was jgoodew...

Hello to all,

To help move forward, I've only left the 2 concepts / designers that have a real chance. Rest assured everyone, I will put all other distinct concepts / designs back in and rank them when judging time comes so everybody who put in work gets awarded points.

The week-end is here and many of you will want to relax and spend time with your friends and families, but the contest ends on Tuesday. No worries, I will extend it a few days if necessary.

I will be checking entries again late tonight my time (Early evening US time) and again tomorrow during the day.

Just a bit of general feedback for everyone (I will make specific comments on the designs in a second): Keep in mind we are a low cost / "good deals" kind of store. The products we will sell will still be quite good quality, but it's our logistics, supplier selection and "no inventory" policy that will allow us to have very low prices. These are not logos, but please look at: http://www.mylivingspace.co.uk/images/discount-logo.jpg or http://mytemplatepackage.net/gifts/MinisiteTemplatesProduct/MiniSitePackSalesletter/images/_discount.gif - some sort of shape like that (I prefer not too regular / geometric, like the 75% one) or even another type of shape as background or somehow integrated in the design could help get that "oomph" and "good deals" feeling we're looking for.

A great week-end to everyone.

-David

Dear designers,

The contest has been extended 5 days and a slogan has been added to the brief.

Best,

-David

Link to a possible design idea: http://www.businesstech.fr/pirate-import/pirate-import-idea.gif - feel free to adapt or derive into something else.

Dear designers,

The slogan has been updated to its french version: "CLIQUEZ. IMPORTEZ. ECONOMISEZ !" (which translates into "CLICK. IMPORT. SAVE !").

Kind Regards,

-David

Dear designers,

The link submitted was just one idea, but feel free to submit other ideas. We still want the general style to be an emblem or pictorial of some sort and the general effect to be punchy / bold, but don't feel you are obligated to go with the idea in that link.

Overall, we are already very impressed with the quality level displayed here. Keep them coming !

Kind Regards,

-David

Many thanks to all the designers who submitted new entries. It's great to see new things and new concepts. Good work! My partner is on the road all day today, so I will provide more detailed feedback tonight.

One quick note that I made to one of the designers, but that I feel can be helpful to everyone: we want the client to feel like the container is coming from far away, but delivered to them / brought at proximity (hence the container coming towards us) by careful logistics. Also, from a business point of view, you could say that people who will be using our site are circumventing the traditional distribution network and saving money by almost being their own importers by going straight to the source: MANUFACTURERS -> OUR SITE -> CUSTOMERS.

I hope this is helpful.

Kind Regards,

-David

One final note: feel free to provide your own feedback on the way I am running this contest. This is my first time, so if there is anything I can do differently to help you more or be more efficient, please do let me know.

Dear designers,

Many thanks to all who have been working with me, submitting new entries and polishing their designs over the last coupel days, somewhat changing the rankings, and definitely bringing all of you closer to each other. The top 4 contestants have all done outstanding work, producing an overall impressively high level of quality.

The rankings here reflect my own personal preference (and yes, #1 means winner ;-) ), but truly, you're all very close to each other, each with your own style and concept. As you all already know, my partner will have input over the week-end, plus we'll have the standard quick survey with a few people. So things can change... People from our target market may or may not agree with my rankings. I'm sure you've heard the same thing from other CH's ;-)

I may contact some of you individually tomorrow with a few final thoughts or small requests for last minute changes and will try my best to be available and provide feedback as needed.

Kind regards,

-David

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 18:55 GMT +0100: OK, folks. I know it's a US holiday, but the evening will be quite festive in the South of France as well, so I'm out for the night. If I can, I'll check entries again when I get back much later tonight, if not, tomorrow morning before the contest ends. Again, many thanks to all for the outstanding work.

One last quick comment before I go: I just spoke to one of my friends who is quite experienced in brand management, and his first comment was that, from a commercial / marketing point of view, a "death's-head" / skull unconsciously carries a negative connotation. Something I didn't think about.

So, for the top 4-5 contestants, maybe slightly altering your design and replacing the skull with something else that carries the pirate connotation (boat, hat, crossed swords... you name it) might be interesting.

OK, I'm out this time... ;-)

Hello,

Many thanks to all for your additional options.

My partner was unreachable again today. We will review and pick a winner as soon as possible, most likely by Wednesday.

Congratulations to everyone for a great contest. We are really impressed with the work produced.

My apologies for inducing this "no skull" disturbing element right at the end. I should have thought about this myself earlier...

Kind Regards,

-David

Quick update: my partner needs more time to decide. Sorry for the delay...

Thanks for the update CH!