In our first post for the new year, I'd like to bring to your attention a little thing that Duane Reade is doing to NYers. If you're not familiar with Duane Reade, it is a local pharmacy chain here in NYC in the same vain as CVS, Walgreens or Rite Aid. First of all let me say this, because I haven't said it before on Word Vomit, but Duane Reade sucks balls for their new hideous designs. They're logo is wretched and the new color palettes they've introduced makes me want to urinate on the Pantone color book that was given to their graphic designer(s).

With that being said, not only have they introduced pastels of doom, they had the nerve to re-do their Spending Rewards Program. This was the only shining thing about the store. In these uncertain economic times, us NYers have come to rely on DR's rewards system. For every dollar you spend, 1 point is given. For every 100 points you get a, $5 coupon is issued. This was good. Those things came in handy, because you could get about $10 every month or so from DR, if you spent enough and sometimes you could. We've come to rely on them. It was a nice gift. Clearly, they saw this and decided to ruin it. So to pay for their expesnive and sucky store remodeling and to pay those awful graphic designers who changed their look, they had to go say fuck you NY and then proceeded to rape us in the face.

They had a mandatory change to the new RewardsFlex program. So this is how it goes now:

For every dollar you spend, 2 points are given. Pretty cool.

For every 500 points you get, $5 coupon is given out to you. Wait what the fuck?!

I roughly had to spend $100 to get $5 back. Now I have to spend $500 to get $5 back? Are you fucking kidding me? I have to spend $500 in Duane Reade? Best Buy doesn't even have the balls to do that and they sell fucking tvs and other shit!

For once I am utterly appalled by this and I wanted to channel my Jewish brethren and write a stern letter of disapproval and vow never to shop in their store again, but then I said to myself, where the hell will I shop at 1:OOAM when I need something? Fuck. Trapped like mice in a cage. Sneaky bastards. They've cornered me with this horrible points system. Do you know how long you could go before you'd spend $500 in Duane Reade? You could go months before you saw a $5 coupon. I'd rather not use it now.

Thanks very, much Duane Reade. I've never willing gotten raped in the face before until now and I've got to tell you -- if you're gonna be raping people in the face like this was Ozwald Penitentiary at least have the decency to have Christopher Meloni around. Fuckers.

Great video on how Comic Sans is a design epidemic. This is an overused, truly childish type face that needs to stop being used over and over again. I won’t get into my hatred for Papyrus right now but enjoy the video and maybe next time you’ll think twice before you create something using Comic Sans.

Now, I am a type fanatic, but I'm going to have to admit: I knew it was a face intended for screen purposes, but I hadn't realized that Verdana had become such a blight on design society. Sure, we know about Papyus (boo, hiss) and Comic Sans (screeeeeeeeeeeee), but Verdana? Causing this kind of hatred, outrage, uproar and even the creation of one of those dreaded and all-powerful Let's All Join this Group 'Cause My Friends Did and It Might Make Me Look Cool Facebook Group? Really?

Okay, sure, it's not the most strategic branding move:

The company has its own brand typeface that's served them well for decades, so swapping for something so generic is a bit bizarre. I'm sure that they have enough in their budget to have commissioned the creation of an updated character set - though, apparently, their decision was heavily impacted by their desire to be able to use the same typeface both in print and on the web. I'll say it again though - their branding has served them quite well for decades, so why they felt the need to make this change now is a bit strange. There are ways around non-web friendly type - and most branded companies aren't using those faces for every aspect of their brand - just the big stuff, you know?

Additionally... it looks like crap. Listen, I don't mind Verdana on screen... but in print? Well... here's a side-by-side comparison of their 2009 and 2010 catalogues (click the photo for a larger version and article):

The old standard just... comes together a bit better than the new. Verdana is one of those simpler fonts, you know? Kind of like that one friend in the group... the one you think is very nice, but who you're sure is also mildly retarded? Kind of like that. It means well, but there are just certain things it cannot do - for example: be used in print.

All of that said... I still don't get why it's sparking such massive anger and disgust. I mean, with some of the reactions I've read, you'd think IKEA had decided to start using Papyrus on everything. Imagine that, people. It could be much worse.

Also... it's IKEA. I mean... does that really impact your day to day that much? Are you subbing ikea.com for your daily porno fix? Are you going to tear all your hair out and kill the mailman in a fit of rage when the catalogue comes? Or spontaneously vomit every time you enter one of their stores? There have been much more unfortunate design foibles in recent branding history (Duane Reade's rebranding comes to mind, as does the Tropicana packaging fiasco). I suppose, if Tropicana is any indication, anything can happen - maybe the Facebook flock will swoop in and restore Ikea Sans to its rightful place in the stack of catalogues you keep by the toilet. Honestly, though, why not just go do your shopping and choke back the vom - this one's really not worth the clean up on aisle five.

Once again, Papyrus plagues our designs. You have such a great wavy type face in your whole design. Yet, you still choose to SHIT on it by placing ( in size 48pt font ) that ugly Papyrus, in the middle of your label. Can anyone give me a explanation why?

Enlighten me please because, it still baffels me how many people use this crap over and over again.

PAPYRUS I FUCKING HATE YOU WITH THE UTMOST PASSION.

I do not understand why everyone uses this font face so much. It has only two places in this world, Egyptian document or the garbage. Yet, people still use them in law books, medical brochures, web pages about pottery, and the list goes on. Curse you Chris Costello for ever even thinking about designing this face.

Seem like I'm not the only one who believes this type face is nothing more that an infestation.

Join the Facebook group I hate Papyrus

or

Head over to the blog I HATE PAPYRUS.ORG and check out how people are mutilating all sorts of designs.

If you know me personally, you would know that I eat everything. Regardless what it is, I'll at least give it a try. Yet, "DELICIOUS SALAD COOKIES", that's something I just might have to pass on.

I forgot to post this 2 weeks ago. American Apparel is selling Helvetica T-Shirts.

You can't beat it. The softest t-shirts with the sickest typeface on the planet.

Crazy thing was, they only had one XL left and it just so happened to be a G.  ( "get it Greg" )

Here is a neat little video explaining why our economy has gone to shit.  Sick use of Kinetic Type to make the point , OH so clear.