# One NZ new logo (2023)

> One NZ launched a new logo in Apr 2023. Apr 1 2023: Vodafone NZ (red speech-mark circle) renamed One NZ with lowercase "one.nz" URL-style wordmark (Mister Wolf/Nick Worthington).

## Key facts

- Brand: One NZ
- Launched: Apr 2023
- What changed: Apr 1 2023: Vodafone NZ (red speech-mark circle) renamed One NZ with lowercase "one.nz" URL-style wordmark (Mister Wolf/Nick Worthington).
- Why: Vodafone New Zealand became One NZ after it was acquired from Vodafone Group and became New Zealand owned.
- Industry: Telecom
- Logos: https://rebrandlog.com/logos/one-nz-2023/before.svg (before), https://rebrandlog.com/logos/one-nz-2023/after.svg (after)

## The rebrand, explained

In 2023 Vodafone New Zealand became One New Zealand. The company told customers it was the same company with a new name, now New Zealand owned, having been acquired from Vodafone Group in May 2019.

NZ Marketing spoke to the creative lead behind the change. The journey began three years earlier, when Infratil and Brookfield bought the business and appointed a new chief executive. A secret team of 20 to 25 people worked under a tight NDA, hiding every option from the rest of the organisation, journalists and competitors, with a goal of making sure 90 percent of the country knew the brand. Design experts, mnemonic experts, film makers and cultural advisers were brought in, with the designs developed with a design studio and film work with a production company.

The idea had to acknowledge the separation from Vodafone while staying connected to Vodafone International. Why One? The creative lead said that when he looked at the word, he saw the last three letters of Vodafone and the future, in a different colour, the colour of New Zealand. The logo borrows the original Vodafone speech mark and turns it 90 degrees so that it becomes a kiwi.

Unusually, the rollout was designed to be slow. Only the name and logo were non-negotiable, he said; how the company grows into its new skin would be shaped with staff and customers, partly because switching a brand overnight, with two logos in the market, is a logistical nightmare.

NZ Marketing's interview with creative lead Nick Worthington described how secret the work was. Only a working group of around 20 to 25 people knew what was going on, and every name under consideration had to be hidden from the whole Vodafone organisation as well as journalists and competitors, which he called very challenging and quite a bit of fun. The goal was that 90 per cent of the country would know the new brand. Keeping a national rebrand that quiet is an achievement in itself, and it explains why the reveal landed with such force.

The kiwi is the best part of this. It is witty, it reads instantly to any New Zealander, and it keeps a thread of recognition with the old speech mark. The name is weaker, a generic word made specific only by the country attached to it. But as a symbol of local ownership, rotating the global giant's logo into a native bird is hard to beat.

In short: The speech mark became a kiwi.

## Sources

- https://one.nz/help/one-nz-change/
- https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/vodafone-nz-officially-rebrands-as-one-nz-and-drops-a-satellite-surprise/E6DS3H637ITBXCCSMVXLL2WN5A/
- https://nzmarketingmag.co.nz/a-symbol-of-the-future-creating-one-new-zealand/

## Cite this

Rebrand Log, "One NZ new logo (2023)", https://rebrandlog.com/rebrand/one-nz-2023/, last updated 2026-10-20.