Three tests, no exceptions
Every logo we design goes through the same three checks before a client ever sees a final file. It sounds strict, and it is meant to be. A mark that only works at presentation size, in full colour, on a white background, is not finished. It is a nice idea that has not been tested yet.
Shrink it until it breaks
The first test is size. We print the mark at favicon scale, roughly the size of a fingernail, and look at it without zooming in. Fine details vanish first: thin strokes close up, small gaps fill in, and anything that relied on delicate line work turns into a smudge. If the mark still reads clearly at that size, it will survive a website tab, a social avatar and a van door just as well as it survives a pitch deck.
Strip the colour out
The second test is print in solid black, no tints, no gradients. Colour is often doing more of the work than a client realises, and a mark that leans entirely on a gradient to feel finished has a structural problem underneath. A logo needs to hold its shape in a single flat colour, because sooner or later it will be printed that way, embroidered that way, or engraved that way, whether anyone planned for it or not.
If a mark cannot survive being reduced to one colour, it was never really finished, it was just decorated.
Put it next to the competition
The third test is context. We place the new mark alongside two or three competitors' logos and look at the set as a whole, not in isolation. This catches two problems at once: marks that are accidentally too similar to something already in the market, and marks that are so safe they disappear into the same visual space as everyone else.
Only when a design has passed all three checks does it leave the studio. If it fails any one of them, it goes back to the board, no matter how much time has already gone into it. That discipline is what stops a client ending up with a logo that looked great on screen and fell apart everywhere else.
