Home Shops Has a New Look!

Home Shops is pleased to announce that we have a new look!  When you launch a company from scratch, there are many details that need to be addressed in short order.  One of these details is branding and a logo.

After the decision was made to place an order with Tangent Scale Models for freelance PS-4750 covered hopper cars, I had to come up with an identity for the company...and fast!   The name "Home Shops" was settled on and this became an integral component of the first logo, shown below:

The above logo was intended to be a stylized railroad shop face, with three large doors that have rails leading to each.  Also included are three text components: 

1 - "HOME SHOPS" - the company name.

2 - "LIMITED EDITIONS" - intended to communicate the small size of our runs.

3 - "FREELANCE DIVISION" - needed to provide clarity with regards to the road names offered.

While this logo served its purpose, it just was not what I wanted to showcase the company long term.  Some people even provided me with the feedback that the logo did not look like a shop front at all.  Rather to them it appeared to be a circuit board or even a bar code!

As the timeline for the arrival of the Robert West painting and the delivery of our first production freight cars draws down, the importance of a logo revamp has been intensifying.  While there are many companies that offer branding services, I really wanted to involve someone who was a model railroader.  Someone who would really understand what Home Shops is all about.

Coincidentally, I would find what I was looking for during a recent lunch with Greg McComas who is the owner of MACRail LLC.  Greg is also the owner of the Freelance Michigan Interstate railroad that will be represented in our first freight car release.  As we were having lunch Greg slid his phone across the table and said: "What do you think about this?"  I found myself looking at a new version of the MACRail logo.  It was slick!  

The old MACRail logo is to the left and the new logo I was looking at is above right!

Greg advised me that he had been in communication with Scott Thornton who is not only a partner at Iowa Scaled Engineering (known for the ProtoThrottle), but he also is a Graphic Designer by trade with his own company, designgrid.  I took a quick look at his website https://www.designgrid.com/ and thought "BINGO!"  High on my to do list was to reach out to Scott Thornton to see if he might be able to assist with taking Home Shops branding to the next level...

Well as it turned out, Scott actually would reach out to me first!  Not to discuss graphic design or the Home Shops logo, but rather to introduce me to his own freelance model railroad concept.  I was impressed with his freelance idea and I do believe you will see quite a bit of that railroad moving forward!

With the introduction now having taken place, I asked Scott if he might be interested in scrubbing the Home Shops logo.  With great enthusiasm he said that he would love to!  I outlined some parameters, the basic elements I wanted to include, and told Scott to have at it!  

"I'll start working on it in a week when I get back from vacation" Scott advised me.  The very next day the framework for the new Home Shops logo was in my inbox!  

I was blown away!  Scott had changed the logo from a "closed design" to a more contemporary "open design".  The blue color was kept per my request because it already had some brand recognition.  The letter "H" was turned into a corrugated shop face with a locomotive coming out of it.  And all of the text elements were incorporated.  And it all came together in a way that looks classy!

Ladies and gentlemen, we have our new logo!!!

Scott Thornton also has his own on-line hobby shop: Scotty's Hobby Shop!  He has some very cool 3D printed products you might want to check out!  

Feel free to visit Scotty's Hobby Shop at: https://www.scottysmodelshop.com/#/

Sometimes, things just fall into place.  We hope you find the new Home Shops Logo as appealing as we do!