Take a look at the new Phoenix Mercury logo

The Phoenix Mercury have undergone a full rebrand ahead of the team's 30th season.

The Mercury surprised WNBA fans when they teased a new look on their social media accounts on Nov. 14. The post told fans that the new look would be released on Nov. 24.

Thoughts of a rebrand have been around for more than five years. Before the team's 25th season in 2020, the Mercury officials considered changing the look, but backed off once the pandemic hit.

Flash forward to 2023, when the rebrand was brought up again and the idea stuck.

"The more we looked at it, we looked at season 30 on the horizon and a brand new era," Mercury President Vince Kozar told The Arizona Republic. "As much as we hoped Diana (Taurasi) would play forever, we knew she probably wouldn’t. With new ownership, we felt it was the perfect time to set a new course for the next 30 years of Mercury basketball.

"All of that went into the next two years of planning and designing and researching and getting feedback, and we’re really excited now that we’re at the point to introduce this to the world.”

The Mercury tasked the team’s two designers with the project. According to Kozar, they went through “literally dozens” of designs before they found the right ones.

After the lengthy process, it came to a point when people in the organization hoped they would roll out the new look earlier.

“The first thing I said was: Go crazy, go and find whatever,” Kozar said. “Bring anything off the wall and put it on the table. That probably had six really distinct options, and the more we went through those and narrowed those down, those were all for the primary mark.”

Then they repeated the process for everything else and landed in the place where the look was an evolution instead of a reinvention. Purple is the primary color for the Mercury, but it was not as featured in the previous logo.

Kozar broke down his favorite parts of the rebrand into two categories: the story side and the business side.

The primary logo still features the “M,” positioned at an angle of 19.97 degrees, a reference to the inaugural season. But the crescent shape echoes the shadowed side of planet Mercury and introduces a prominent splash of purple. The sharp right corner of the “M” serves as a nod to the original geometric rings.

The global logo features the primary emblem at the center, with four rings positioned behind it, mirroring the planetary rings on the team’s original design. The “M” divides the four rings into eight individual lines that symbolize the Mercury’s status as one of the eight original WNBA franchises.

“I think our fans should be able to see our old marks within the new marks, and that’s really important,” Kozar said. “We’re really proud of our history, and we’re really proud of the 30 years of investment from fans and coaches and the ownership we’ve had here."

The secondary logo, which is a first for the franchise, features the outline of Arizona with seams of a basketball to celebrate the state. The logo also includes the official introduction of the popular "Merc" moniker into the branding, a nickname players and fans have long used to refer to the team.

The Mercury's look has undergone minor tweaks since the team's inception in 1997, but the biggest change was taking out yellow in the color scheme in 2010.

To build off the rollout, the Mercury will offer two activities for fans, including a merchandise swap.

Fans can exchange any Mercury, WNBA or WNBA team merchandise for a new T-shirt, now through Dec. 5 at the Team Shop at Mortgage Matchup Center. Apparel collected will be donated to Goodwill, and fans who participate in the merchandise swap will also receive a voucher for 20% off a new Mercury item.

For bolder fans, the first 100 people who sign up will get a free tattoo of the primary logo at Lady Luck Tattoo in downtown Phoenix.

“The fans are the ones who have been here supporting us for 30 years," Kozar said. "We think an opportunity to hand them a piece of merchandise totally free of charge will lower that barrier, so anyone can be a fan is really representative of who we are as a company and how Mat (Ishbia) is as an owner.”

Reach the reporter at [email protected], as well as @jennarortiz on X.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Phoenix Mercury debut a new look, offer 100 fans an option for tattoo