When we were setting up the Wild Rose Interactive website, we received many offers for services. Most of those services were things we didn’t need or didn’t want. The one exception was Logo Designers Online, who made us an offer to make a logo for us for free. We did some research before deciding to take them up on the offer. Jump below the fold to see what we thought.

Only one of these facts is verifiably true.

We weren’t going to just let anybody have access to our information, so we started researching. There weren’t too many reviews, but the website appeared to be new. The phone number listed on their website had a New York City area code. Some of the companies listed in the portfolio existed and were using the logo that Logo Designers Online portrayed. They did not appear to be a scam.

At that point, we had a few questions, including how much the website designs cost. We weren’t interested in a website, but we couldn’t find the price. We sent an email to a customer service representative and soon received a confusing response. We could buy the websites and other services at LogoInn, their sister company. The two sites didn’t link to each other, but the WhoIs domain lookup showed they had the same owner, a man in London. (It is likely Logo Designers Online is a franchise of LogoInn. Here’s the link to their franchise page – it’s tough to find manually.) They also offered us a discount. Their discounted price is the only price they ever use. It would be like us saying No Good Wife is “free for this month” every single month.

After exchanging a few more emails to confirm information, we were ready to order a logo. When we got to the ordering screen, we discovered another problem. They wanted us to input a phone number and a preferred time to call, but there was no place to indicate your time zone. We sent them more emails to no response, but it turns out you don’t even need to put in a phone number. You can just put in an area code and tell them to email you in the “do not use” box.

The logo designer we ended up with used pigeon English when communicating with us. Our design took four days, which is twice as long as the 48 hours we were told it would take. We didn’t like the original version, so we asked for a change. 48 hours later, it was delivered. We accepted that design.

The unedited Wild Rose Interactive Logo. Note the black background and the negative space.

Here’s where things get manipulative. You know that “free logo” agreement? What they really mean is “free 614X285 pixel jpg file”. This might be fine for some people, but we wanted to use it for other things, so they offered us other file types and file sizes for $25 USD. Begrudgingly, we took them up on the offer.

The silly thing is that if they had told us the other files cost money before we agreed to the logo, we would have been fine with it. They have to make money somehow. The fact that they willfully hid that information has turned us off from working with Logo Designers Online or their sister companies ever again.