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FRSB knew about logo issue four months ago

Fundraising | Gemma Ware | 1 Jun 2007

The FRSB knew about logo issue four months ago, reports Gemma Ware.

The Fundraising Standards Board has known since the end of February that its use of the acronym "FSB" would be an issue, when it withdrew an application to register its old logo as a trademark.

Last week the self-regulatory body confirmed that it had changed its logo and would now be known as the FRSB, after complaints from the Federation of Small Businesses about its use of the acronym FSB.

The FRSB had applied for a trademark with the UK Intellectual Property Office in December under section 42, a category that includes other self-regulatory organisations such as the Advertising Standards Authority. However, it withdrew the application on 26 February after it became aware of a complaint from the Federation, which is registered under a different category.

Colin Lloyd, chair of the FRSB, told Charity News Alert that the organisation had not foreseen the problem with the Federation arising, because there were "dozens and dozens of FSBs". "This is a trade association for small businesses and we're a self-regulatory body, that's why there are different categories."

Lloyd said that an announcement about the issue was not made earlier because time was needed to reach a legal agreement with the Federation. "We needed complete clarification, we also needed to work out what we were going to be called going forward as well, and that needed to be discussed amongst the board."

No payment settlement was made with the Federation, and Lloyd said the cost of the changes to the logo had been "nominal". He added that the legal fees incurred were "relatively small" in comparison with what they would have been had the organisation gone on to fight a longer legal case.

"I made the decision, along with the rest of the board, that spending two years fighting through the courts and spending tens of thousands of pounds of government and our members' money was not the right thing for us to do for a company that's just got off the ground," he said.

Already gone to print

The FRSB decided not to tell new members joining the scheme about the possible change to the logo until last week, meaning some had begun using it on printed material. "We felt there was sufficient time to inform them at the appropriate moment," said Lloyd. "New applications take some time to process, and the timescale was a few weeks rather than a few months. It's not been a problem."

Lloyd said the reaction from charities had been "benign" with many asking for the new logo to use on mailings. He added: "This will be past us faster than we can ever think."

Aneesha Moreira, director of fundraising at the British Heart Foundation, which started using the logo on its materials shortly after it joined the FRSB in June, said: "While it is not ideal that the logo is being changed at this stage, we understand the reasons.

"The Fundraising Standards Board has advised us that we should use 'reasonable endeavours' to ensure that the existing logo is not used post-1 November. That offers some flexibility and that is the approach we will take."

Gill Raikes, director of fundraising at the National Trust, which had only used the old logo once on an e-newsletter, said it had no surplus stock to use up. "It hasn't been a big issue for us, and won't make a big impact. It won't cost us anything," she said.

James Page, managing partner at brand strategy consultants Muse Strategy, said: "Obviously it's not great for the credibility of an organisation responsible for the maintenance of standards to be seen not to have done its homework."

He said that many organisations, such as the Food Standards Agency and the Financial Services Authority, co-exist quite happily with shared acronyms. "What's surprising in this instance is that having shared the letters for some time this sort of problem wasn't anticipated."

However, Page added: "The solution seems a perfectly sensible one and I doubt that the audiences for whom the new identity was created will notice the inclusion of an additional letter."

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