Official State Tourism Logos, Ranked

You know how every state has a special tourism-use logo? No? Well, they do. I suspect a lot of people who weren’t aware of this became aware of this because a tweet with all the state tourism logos recently went sort of viral, though, to be fair, this seems to happen every so often, as the same graphic seems to have gone viral in 2022. I guess the allure of state tourism logos is just that strong.

Anyway, this image of all these logos (which actually seem to be about a decade out of date; I’ll show an image with more current logos at the end of the article) captured our attention here, so we decided what the hell, let’s rank them! It’ll be fun, right? Right?

Before I started writing about cars full time, I was a designer, and I absolutely loved logo design. I still do, really. So there’s an inherent appeal to this for me, though when I agreed to write something about this, I don’t think I appreciated how big a number 50 can be.

Official state logos. What do you guys think. pic.twitter.com/gQrGHilr7f

— ettingermentum🥥🌴 (@ettingermentum) June 10, 2024

Still, I said I’d rank these, so that’s what I’m going to do, dammit. Here we go!

 

50. West Virginia

This one is just terrible. It looks like it was made with whatever design software came on a Packard Bell in 1998 and represents at least 12 minutes of labor.

49. Kansas

This logo could be for almost anything. Well, anything boring. This feels like a local property management company’s logo, or maybe a firm that makes components for vacuum flasks. Plus, that motto, “as big as you think” is hardly something that would excite tourists. Oh boy, they’ll think, it’s what I thought it was, scale-wise!

48. Delaware

I guess the plus side of this one is that the script sort of feels like the badging of a ’70s Cadillac. Other than that, this tells you absolutely nothing about the state or why you should visit it, which feels pretty on-brand for Delaware, a state whose state bird is a notepad with the word “bird” scrawled on it. Matt says it looks like a signature, which is significant, since the only thing people do in Delaware is form LLCs.

47. Washington

Washington’s logo feels like the icon for some kind of shitty app that, I don’t know, tracks your bowel movements in relation to the current value of bitcoin or something like that. It even says BETA 1.0 on it? Why? The state better not be in beta still, they’ve had since 1889 to figure this out.

46. Connecticut

Okay okay, we get it, Connecticut has the word “connect” in it. Cool. By showing that, the logo also makes clear that the rest of the name spells out “I cut” which is a little sinister. I respect Helvetica and all that, but this feels pretty phoned-in.

45. Massachusetts

The only thing I like about this logo is how the ® symbol over the period looks a little like a question mark, making the tagline “It’s all here?” which feels much more appropriate.

44. North Dakota

This one and South Dakota feel like they worked together, or one copied off the other to come up with this cheesy, over-exuberant sort of half-script look. This has way too many live laugh love vibes.

43. South Dakota

Like I said, the typography just feels like a slightly more curvy and clean version of the North Dakota logo, but they threw in their big Mountain of Presidents’ Faces, which, sure, they should do that. What other state has Lincoln’s nostrils so big you can sleep in them?

42. New Hampshire

This looks like the box art of some really disappointing educational wooden toy village set, or something. The kind of thing guaranteed to ruin a kid’s birthday when some Montessori-addled aunt gives it as a gift.

41. Oklahoma

I’m all for Oklahoma pushing their Native American heritage, but how exactly did an Art Deco typeface end up on something about Native Americans? I don’t mind it, I just don’t get the connection.

40. South Carolina

Ah yes, Garbage Carolina! Crescent moon, that tree, and an extremely ’90s-looking typographic treatment. This feels like it hasn’t been thought about in 30 years. Good.

39. Arizona

It just feels like that 99¢ iced tea in the tall cans.

38. Virginia

Virginia has had this motto since 1969, and I have yet to see any evidence this is true. They don’t even like it when you try to love yourself in one of their rest stops!

37. Ilinois

What is this one? It just seems to be emphasizing how long it feels when you’re trying to drive out of the damn state.

36. Iowa

This one really baffles me. It has slight medical/rehab facility feelings, and there’s something about the word life in those kinds of italics, next to one of these things:|, that makes me want to puke a bit. You can pair this logo with those pictures of women laughing alone with salad.

35. Ohio

Okay, but this logo is not balanced! Why not have a similar-sized O on both sides? What am I missing here?

34. Nebraska

Ugh, this one is boring aigh eff. I guess I like how the – what is that, a piece of hay?– forms the crossbars of the As? But that motto “possibilities…endless” is deeply weird. Why the ellipsis? It sounds like the cryptic dying words of some scientist on the verge of a breakthrough, but then gets killed in a lab explosion or some shit.

33. Missouri

I get what they were going for here, but this feels like a t-shirt from some fraternity’s waterslide blowout.

32. Indiana

I’m all for the Indy 500 references like in that motto, but there’s nothing else remotely race-like about this. Are those skid marks? And that typeface looks like it should be the titles for some Star Wars rip-off movie.

31. Minnesota

This feels very Minnesota in that I expect it to have been made by someone’s sweet aunt who is about to apologize for it.

30. Vermont

This feels pretty dated, typographically, but I guess that gestural mountain isn’t bad, if your goal is to make a logo that’s able to be forgotten almost immediately.

29. Maryland

Maryland’s logo is a third-tier pizza chain. Maybe they have a special pizza with crab on it, or something.

28. Kentucky

Matt said this looks like an airline for horses, and he’s absolutely right.

27. Florida

Orange, I guess because oranges grow there, and everything else because no one really gave a shit.

26. Arkansas

Okay, the motto is sort of clever. And there’s a little leaf. How am I not even halfway done? Why did I agree to do this?

25. Colorado

I don’t even know what “let’s talk” means in this context. This looks like a logo that was agreed on when someone important glanced up from their phone and said “sure.”

24. New Mexico

I guess at least they’re trying something more bold here, with everything wood-burned into a partially-eaten graham cracker.

23. Tennessee

This one has a certain fun quality about it, and I think I just this second realized that shape on the “horizon” is supposed to evoke a guitar? I thought it was, like, a collapsed cow. And are those whiskers above the first E?

22. North Carolina

I suppose I admire North Carolina’s restraint here. I kind of like the typography, with those extended Ls and ts, but it’s maybe a bit too modest. Also, I admire how it conveys fuck-all about the state.

21. Alabama

I know what it’s supposed to be, but it looks like Sweet Alabama Home. Also, it feels like a minor league baseball team. Very minor.

20. New Jersey

This one only made it this high because I forgot about it. It looks like some early-2000s dialysis company.

19. Idaho

Idaho has to show you a map of where it is because they’re correctly assuming you forgot.

18. Lousiana

I kind of like the crude look of the typography? And they sure did a good job avoiding all the cliched things that people may actually know or give a damn about when it comes to Louisiana, so, congratulations, I guess?

17. Utah

I admire how the designer was just not going to let that U get away with not having bottom serifs. Not on their watch.

16. Texas

Oh, I get it! Like from pants! The jeans-pants! Like what cowboys would pack their testicles into!

15. Nevada

I like Nevada’s logo because it evokes all of the rare, old, limited-edition books and obscure folios that the state is best known for.

14. Wyoming

You know what? Wyoming’s logo works.

13. California

I guess that’s a clever tagline, but this logo absolutely feels like it’s for some kind of prescription drug, maybe for IBS or some skin thing, or maybe incontinence. Yeah, incontinence, because that explains the liquidly yellow line.

12. Maine

The gray color and simple, basic design really manage to capture the long-term-records-storage-rivaling excitement of Maine.

11. Pennsylvania

I kinda like the keystone and simple typography. Feels like the logo of a general contractor I trust.

10. Montana

If a player piano was a logo, this would be it.

9. Oregon

Good on Oregon for making one of the few vertically oriented logos. And, I guess by pushing trees, they’re playing it pretty safe. There are trees there.

8. Michigan

This one only gets this high because I’m so used to seeing it on the back of press cars I get.

7. Wisconsin

This one also kinda slipped in because I forgot about it earlier. Wisconsin, in white, sort of looks like a chef’s hat, doesn’t it?

6. Rhode Island

I like Rhode Island’s logo because it manages to evoke tattoos and scrimshaw and Moby Dick, which is pretty good for two words and a symbol.

5. New York

I mean, even for my jaded ass, this is a classic. Milton Glaser came up with it back in 1976, and it still gets the job done today.

4. Mississippi

Mississippi’s logo clearly has fun with the idiosyncratic name, and feels whimsical and a little evocative of times past, which, in Mississippi’s case, is kind of dangerous territory. Still, it’s fun.

3. Georgia

Maybe because I’ve gotten used to seeing this after all those movies and television shows shot in Atlanta, but I like the friendly typography and the stylized, colorful peach. In my head, this isn’t just a peach, it’s the “Big Butt” water tower shaped like a peach around Gaffney, South Carlina. That thing is called the Peachoid? I had no idea. Also, I thought it was in Georgia! I’ve got a lot of growing up to do.

2. Hawaii

I think I just put this at number two because I’m desperate for color. Also, the rough characters seem to feel right for this.

1. Alaska

I like this one! I like how the As have become mountain peaks, I like the irregular baseline, it feels active and clever and still simple and clear. Good job!

 

Oy, that was a lot. And, as promised, here’s what the updated state tourism logos look like (as of 2022), courtesy of journalist Hunter Schwartz, who seems to have been the first person to notice this.:

(from Hunter Schwarz)

 

Some are the same; some are better, some may be worse. Feel free to discuss them in the comments, because I’m fucking done.

 

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