What's up with the new icon?
If you upgraded to our most recent version of ShopSavvy (Cupcake compatible) you may have noticed that we changed the icon. The feedback is about 50/50 – half of you like the new icon and half of you hate it. The number of emails we are getting is significant enough that I thought it was worth a blog post (i.e. so we can link to this instead of trying to reply personally to each email).
When we first built ShopSavvy it was called GoCart. The original blue icon (check mark with two dots) was meant to look like a ‘cart’ – i.e. it was the ‘GoCart’ icon. Sometime after that Google released icon design guidelines that our original icon did not conform to. Our icon was ‘grandfathered’ and was allowed to remain. Shortly after that T-Mobile hired a company to come up with a ‘better’ name for GoCart. GoCart was perfect if you were a 20-something developer, but according to their advisers it didn’t work with the G1 target demographic. They came up with the name ShopSavvy and we agreed to go along with the name change. Of course, the timing of the launch didn’t give us much time to generate a new icon so we stuck with the old ‘cart’ related image we originally created.
We have never really been happy with the ‘cart’ icon, but it was never a priority until we began to launch in Europe. Turns out ‘ShopSavvy’ doesn’t mean much to someone living in Austria or Poland. In fact, not a single person we talked to had any incling as to what it might refer to. Our carrier partners asked us to change the name. For a number of reasons this was unacceptable to us, but they did offer an alternative. They suggested that we change the icon to include a ‘barcode’ giving users a clear understanding that ShopSavvy must be that barcode scanning application. Working under a tight deadline yet again, we struggled to come up with a clear barcode that works in a 48x48pt form factor and met the Android icon design guidelines. More than 50 designers provided comps for us to review – I blogged about the competition here. In the end we settled on the simplest version. Hopefully those of you who speak English will ‘get it’ that we are still ShopSavvy and those of you who are new to ShopSavvy with ‘get it’ that we are that barcode price comparison application.
It kind of a little sad that google and T-mobile have that much control on on the applicaton market. So sad that you have to change to please google and t-mobile. So if we can’t get back the icon that we love and it have to show a bar code then; make it beautiful and add a little hand scanner showing it is scanning a bar code.
I get it. I think it’s important to note the impact something as small as an icon can have on a product when it goes from national to international. It’s the whole point of marketing.
Also it’s worth noting to prepare for change when more decision makers are involved in the process of a growing company.
I think the barcode looks cleaner, but it surprises me that so many would take the time to write about an icon. I learned something new.
I like the other icon and I put it on my desktop before the new version came. I still got the blue cart on the menu which I think is better then the barcode. Please edit the new barcode to be something more…. Well more blue. Maybe a blue outside of a barcode with light/glow green lines (as the bars). I think that would be great. Anyway, I liked the old icon better. Pity T-Mobile is controlling.
Put me firmly in the ‘do not like’ camp. It’s not an ugly icon, but it loses some of the differentiation between ShopSavvy and compareeverywhere and bacrcode scanner.
I wish Android allowed for alternate icons, or user defined ones…
Regardless of icon, ShopSavvy is still one of my favorite/most used apps.
And regarding T-mobile’s control… It’s a trade off – ShopSavvy is featured in every T-Mo store’s G1 display. (Will they change their graphics?)
I like the new icon over the old one. the 3D dimensioning matches well with the default icons in Android. However, this is just an idea, but I LOVE the Chinese Food Box you’ve got on the homepage . The coloring is perfect (green would work too tho) and to show that ShopSavvy is a barcode app, you might be able to make the other side of the box (the side without the Android) a barcode. I know that’s a lot of design for such a small icon but like I said, its just an idea.
I understand now. It is unfortunate though.