The hidden costs of the new 2012 logo.

The response to the launch of the new brand for London 2012 has been lukewarm at best. 'Bloody embarrassing' and 'makes you want to emigrate rather than face the shame of it' were two of the more positive comments in our office this lunchtime.

Now as a public sector worker I'm used to crap branding chosen by committees who have the visual sense of Stevie Wonder. So what worries me is how much is this going cost us, the taxpayer. Not the £500,000 it cost to come up with (ever feel that you are in the wrong job?) but the millions in lost sponsorship we will have to cough up for.

The organising committee are expecting big multinationals to cough up millions for the right to plaster that logo all over their products. If they don't, and if you were a brand manager would you let that near your products?, the Games, or at least the taxpayer, are screwed. You might have thought that given all the other wrangling over the budget and the £2billion odd stakes involved they might have played it safe. Well you have got to admire their balls if not their design sense.

On a brighter note, I can't wait to see the discarded designs if that was the best they could come up with.