Erste GroupCopied

Erste Group, the Austrian savings bank group with subsidiaries across Central and Eastern Europe, announced on 27 December 2022 that its whole visual identity would be fundamentally modernised from January 2023. The familiar Erste and Sparkassen logo would be optimised for digital media, with a new unified typeface and new colours, rolling out step by step in Austria, Croatia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary.

The logo stays recognisable but changes in detail. The company said that moving to a slimmer S and to white monochrome as the default colour harmonises the word and image mark and optimises it for digital use. Leadersnet reported the same changes and noted that the logo is recognisable at first glance, with eight new design colours making the look more modern. The bank added that the colours were chosen to be accessible, and that the multicolour approach builds a bridge to the design of its George online banking platform. The new typeface is Inter, chosen because it works both in print and on screen.

The stated motive is coherence and modernity. Erste said its brand communication rests on the founding idea of the savings banks and a purpose driven approach centred on belief in people's potential, and that the new design would make that look fresher, more modern and more approachable, creating consistent brand experiences across all channels. Two Austrian branches, on the Graben in Vienna and in Klosterneuburg, already showed the new design at launch. The bank also pointed out that Brand Finance had named Erste the strongest brand in Austria in 2022, which explains why the update is so careful.

This is a textbook digital first refresh, and it inherits all of the genre's tradeoffs. Thinner strokes and white on colour render crisply on phones, and tying the corporate palette to George makes sense, since the app is where most customers now meet the bank. But eight colours, Inter and a monochrome mark is also the default kit of almost every fintech of the period, and the bolder S was one of the few things that made Erste instantly identifiable in a crowded market. The bank kept the shape and lost some of the presence. It is competent, accessible and slightly anonymous.