While working as a junior clerk at the Rochester Savings Bank, George Eastman first began commercial production of dry photographic plates in a rented loft of a building in Rochester, New York in April 1880. In the next few years, Eastman became very successful and expanded the company several times. His company started as the Eastman Dry Plate Company in 1881, later became the Eastman Dry Plate and Film Company in 1884, and soon after the Eastman Company in 1889. The last name change occurred in 1892, when the Eastman Kodak Company of New York was organized. The company has been called Eastman Kodak Company ever since.
The word "Kodak" was first registered as a trademark in 1888. The letter “K” had been a favorite of Eastman’s, he is quoted as saying, "I devised the name myself. The letter 'K' had been a favorite with me; it seems a strong, incisive sort of letter. It became a question of trying out a great number of combinations of letters that made words starting and ending with 'K.' The word 'Kodak' is the result." He said that there were three principal concepts he used in creating the name: it should be short, one cannot mispronounce it, and it could not resemble anything or be associated with anything but Kodak.
In 1907, the company’s name was officially changed to the Eastman Kodak Company. In that time period, a logo based on lettering was quite typical. Kodak is arguably the first company to integrate its brand name, Eastman Kodak Company and look, into an emblem.
Almost 30 years after introducing their monogram logo, in 1935 the team designed a new Kodak symbol, this time focusing on the word “Kodak” alone. The new emblem featured a bright red inscription, written in a bold font with slab serifs.
At the same time, a variation of this logo was introduced, featuring the same inscription on a yellow background with a black border. This was the first time Kodak introduced the core shades of its modern colour palette: yellow and red. George Eastman personally selected the distinctive red and yellow pattern, which is now widely known throughout the world. The use of the red color symbolizes love, passion, expression and life, whereas the yellow color stands for happiness, joy and optimism.
The rectangular shaped logo was changed a quarter century later to a triangular shape in 1960. Kodak called it a “corner curl design”. The purpose of the new design was to give a new and unique look to the emblem. The name “Kodak” retained red for the letters and yellow for the background.
The corner curl design remained in use for just over a decade until 1971, when Kodak designers restyled the logo once again in order to keep pace with the new generation of the 70s. This time the logo was in a square shape, also called a box shape. Inside the box was a graphic element “K”. The emblem retained the familiar red and yellow colors and the Kodak name. The letters spelling Kodak were in serif fonts.
Kodak decided to give their logo a more contemporary and modernistic look 16 years later in 1987. They streamlined the Kodak name within the existing logo by changing the font type from serif to sans serif.
A completely new design, or re-design, was implemented in 2006. The box shape was completely removed and the word “Kodak” was given a custom-made fresh, rounded typeface for a more modern and elegant look. The letters are positioned inside yellow bars.
The Kodak “wordmark” change to the brand’s vintage yellow-and-red K/arrow symbol is intended to offer a ‘more international and universal impact’, and to distance the company from its film and processing past.
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