Assessing the Importance of Tradition in NFL Team Branding

The two teams pictured above are both charter members of the AFL, with 50 year traditions. While experimenting with various looks and logos, the Jets returned to their classic look several years ago.

The Bills, on the other hand, while hauling the "throwback" out of mothballs for a game or two each year, are on their third and most dramatically contemporary look.

Just over a third of NFL franchises still use their classic look. A few have made minor variations on a theme. Another third have changed their look, and even their colors, several times, or are too new to evaluate for staying power.

What can be learned and inferred from the franchises that choose to keep traditional branding, versus franchises that change with the trends every few years? Is there a correlation between style and success?

It should be noted, we are referring to the modern era of the NFL that begins roughly at the end of the '50s or the beginning of the '60s when teams began widespread use of helmet art (unless you're Cleveland!).

Green Bay's Oval G

The fine detail of graphics may be tweaked every few years, but the Packers have stayed with the same look they've had since they first put artwork on their helmets, back in the very early '60s.

Chicago Bears, Still the Same

Ditto what we said about Green Bay. Bring out Bob Seger for a chorus of "Still the Same."

The Colts, New Town, Same Threads

Peyton Manning or Johnny U. Maybe the stripes are a little different but that's about it.

Of course, we oppose taking a storied team like the Colts out of Baltimore, and a re-location is a good opportunity to re-brand, but the Colts opted for making a statement about franchise tradition transcending location.

Cleveland Browns, I & II Bland, boring, plain, wonderful helmets!

The deal that sent the original Browns franchise, started by its namesake Paul Brown, to Baltimore, makes Soviet style revisionist history look honest. The league decided to pretend that the franchise began in Baltimore as if it were an expansion team.

All records and stats and history relative to the franchise in Cleveland would be separated out for a future Cleveland expansion team to acquire.

Sounds to us like a way to get an expansion franchise with a veteran roster.

At any rate, the tradition of the Browns, if not the true history of the franchise, continues in Cleveland today much as it did dating back to the All-America Football Conference in the late forties. Cleveland was one of four AAFC teams folded into the NFL when the AAFC folded.

Change the one to a two in the photo above and that could be Jimmy Brown. Not much has changed in the uniform.

Oakland Raiders, Silver and Black Forever

The Raiders have not altered their uniforms in any significant conceptual way since Day One.

Pittsburgh Steelers Ironclad Look

The franchise does drag out a yellow helmet on throwback day, but you have to back pretty far to find the time when they used it. In the modern era, there's been only the plain black helmet on one side with the variation of the US Steel Corporation logo on the other.

Now US Steel is a shadow of its original self, most of their huge, belching factories have been replaced by modern high tech industry offices, but the football franchise maintains the legacy in their look.

Miami Dolphins Have the Look

Since their admission to the AFL as an expansion team, the Miami Dolphins have kept the same basic logo and look with only cosmetic stylistic tweaks.

Kansas City's Classic Arrowhead

When the franchise began in Dallas as the Texans, the uniform was pretty much the same. There was a solid red helmet with a white form in the shape of the map of Texas.

When Lamar Hunt moved his franchise to Kansas City three years later, he changed the Texas map to an Arrowhead with KC ensconced inside the outline and there have been no significant changes since (1963).

Is that No. 4 Len Dawson? You'd never know without a closeup on the face.

Purple People Eaters Maybe, but Uniform Keepers They Are

Other than the usual stylistic updates in striping, the classic Viking uniform is unchanged since the franchise's inception. That could be Fran Tarkington except for the skin color.

San Francisco May Be the Change Capital of America but not in Football

Again, minor stylistic tweaks on the threads but not in the colors or on the helmet. This is the only uniform San Fransisco has had since inception.

Dallas Cowboys: Second Time's a Charm

The Cowboys have us torn. Their current look has become their classic look. It hasn't changed since their early years. Yet their "throwback," the first Cowboy's uniform, with the starker contrast of blue and white and the more dramatic definition of the star on the jersey and the helmet almost makes us wish they'd revert to that one.

Either way, the team is classic.

Jets Go Back to the Future with Original Look

They were the New York Titans for a year or two, but when they became the Jets, this was their look. It was their look when Broadway Joe Namath (pictured above) took them to their brightest day, based out of Shea, and it is their look now, when Namath is honored at Giants Stadium.

In between, however, the Jets experimented with a more modern look. We congratulate them for returning to the classic.

Detroit Lions: Minor Variations on a Theme

When the Buffalo Bills used royal blue and silver as their colors with plain silver helmets for the first year (only) in the AFL, it was to copy the Lions, of which Bills owner Ralph Wilson, Jr. was a minority owner as well.

Other than adding the lion image and making subtle changes in the lion's shape or posture over the years, the Lions look hasn't changed much.

Cincinnati Bengals: Same Helmet, Different Threads

The Bengals, Paul Brown's second franchise, were designed to look exactly like the Cleveland Browns, his first, with the exception of the plain orange helmets, to which Brown added the Bengal tiger stripe.

The helmets remain essentially as they were, however the uniform style, color distribution and graphics have changed with the times.

Cardinals, Whatever the City, the Same Old Birds

The Cardinal uniforms have had various looks over the years, reflecting trends and styles of a given era, but whether in St. Louis or Arizona (Chicago predates the modern era) the helmet look has essentially survived.

The Cardinal on the helmet received an attitude adjustment for the '08 season. Perhaps that's what got them to the Superbowl. But the change was quite subtle and didn't stray from the basic concept of the team logo.

New Orleans Saints Keep the Faith

The color of the pants has changed back and forth from white to black over the years, but the basic uniform look and the helmet are constant since the team's inception.

St. Louis Rams: Same Theme, Systematic Updates

The classic Ram horn on the helmet hasn't changed much in size or style. Otherwise there have been lots of variations in the uniform styles, color distribution and graphics.

The franchise has found a way to balance tradition with fashion trends in their approach to systematic updates. Now if we could just keep them in one town for more than a few decades at a time (Cleveland, LA, St. Louis).

New York Giants: Subtle Changes

The Giants have kept some classic elements in their look but have also altered the look enough so that there really is no classic Giants image.

Mood Rings: Pre-Merger Teams that Follow the Trends

These are the teams in existence before the merger who change their look and/or their colors frequently.

The Falcons have used variations on the same basic logo but have done so with red helmets, black helmets, smaller image, larger image, all black uniforms in Jerry Glanville's era, red, black and white, etc.

The Bills have gone through a variety of color and uniform variations using navy blue, royal blue, slight variations in the shade of red, white helmets, red helmets, blue pants, white pants, with at least three distinctly different treatments of the buffalo in the logos.

The Bucs have had more looks than Imelda Marcus had shoes.

The Redskins and Eagles have been the most dynamic of the original NFL teams. They were among the first to adopt helmet art, and have continued to revise. We've lost count of the concepts and color configurations either or both of these teams have used over the years.

The Chargers have stayed closer to one theme but have varied it significantly in color and more subtly in logo presentation.

The Patriots changed their look significantly three times in their 50 year history, as another AFL original.

The Bronchos have had four different looks in their fifty year history as AFL originals.

Post Merger Expansion Teams: Some Do, Some Don't

The newest expansion teams are too new to evaluate, but there are the Seahawks who have kept the integrity of their helmet logo but have changed everything else including colors.

The Jaguars and Panthers have their original look after more than a decade.

The Texans are basically the same as at inception but haven't been around as long.

The Titans suited us by changing their name and their look after leaving Houston. Whether or not they will keep the look long enough to make it classic is yet to be seen.

The Ravens have created a classic post-Cleveland look.

So... it splits out more or less 50/50 with the jury still out on the newest ones.

So, How does brand & image consistency translate to competitive success?

The following teams have made no significant changes to their look in the modern era of the NFL:

Green Bay: 4 Super Bowls, 3 Lombardi's
Chicago: 3 Super Bowls, 1 Lombardi
Colts: 3 Super Bowls, 2 Lombardi's
Cleveland: 0 Super Bowls
Oakland: 4 Super Bowls, 2 Lombardi's
Pittsburgh: 6 Superbowls, 6 Lombardi's
Miami: 3 Super Bowls, 1 Lombardi
Kansas City: 2 Super Bowls, 1 Lombardi
Minnesota: 4 Super Bowls, 0 Lombardi's
San Francisco: 4 Super Bowls, 4 Lombardi's
Dallas: 8 Super Bowls, 5 Lombardi's
Jets: 1 Super Bowl, 1 Lombardi

Between these 12 teams, there are 43 Super Bowl appearances for an average of just under 3.6 appearances. There have been 26 Super Bowl victories between them for an average of 2.1.

The remaining 20 teams who have had at least a significant degree of change in uniform, logo and branding since the beginning of the modern era have made 43 Super Bowl appearances for an average of less than two, and have won 17 victories for an average of less than 1 per team.

The Mood Rings fare even worse as a subgroup in the non-classic teams. These eight teams made a composite total of 15 appearances in the Big Game but won only four.

It seems obvious that there is a direct and significant correlation between classic team branding and competitive success.