Eskom wants to spend millions on a new logo

Eskom has launched a multi-million-rand tender to design a new company logo and develop a new corporate identity.

The Eskom tender document states it needs a new corporate identity to represent its new structure with three independent subsidiaries – Generation, Transmission, and Distribution.

Eskom asked agencies to apply to design, develop, and implement a new corporate identity for the entities below.

• National Transmission Company of South Africa
• National Distribution Company of South Africa
• Potential Eskom NewCo
• Any other Eskom Group of companies in the future

Although price details have not been disclosed, Eskom asked agencies who tendered for the project to assume a budget of R5 million per entity in their presentations.

This multi-million tender has extensive requirements, including designing a slew of printed and digital assets, marketing material, and online assets.

The cost of designing and executing a new logo and corporate identity for Eskom is only the tip of the iceberg.

To rebrand, a company has to change the logo on all its buildings, digital assets, printed materials, and much more. It will cost a fortune.

Ghaleb Cachalia, the DA’s shadow minister of public enterprises, slated Eskom’s decision considering its financial position.

“This is a completely unnecessary vanity project that contributes nothing towards solving South Africa’s load-shedding crisis,” he said.

Cachalia added that a new Eskom logo will also not help consumers who are struggling to pay sky-high electricity prices.

The DA called on the acting Eskom CEO, Calib Cassim, to immediately rescind this tender as it amounts to frivolous expenditure.

“With Eskom warning that load-shedding can be introduced on short notice, it is astounding that their priority is a logo change,” he said.

“Instead of looking to increase generation capacity and do away with load-shedding permanently, Eskom thinks it is necessary to focus on sprucing up their image.”

He said the millions associated with the logo and rebranding contract could be better spent elsewhere.