Why some consumers want no logos on their gifts this season

Wielding scalpels, irons, seam rippers and permanent markers, an undercurrent of logo-conscious shoppers are removing and hiding the decals from their clothing.

“Why would I do someone else’s advertising for free?” Max Ilich, a 47-year-old consultant from New Hampshire told the Wall Street Journal. He painstakingly removes every stitch of the Lacoste crocodile with a scalpel, saying he likes the shirts for their quality but didn’t want to be co-opted as a walking billboard.

With the iconic Crocodylus porosus as perhaps the sartorial ancestor, clothing logos have evolved and swelled in the past decades. On mid-tier brands like Abercombie & Fitch or Juicy Couture they could take up an entire sweatshirt or posterior.

But, perhaps as a sign of a branding backlash, those lines are now pivoting, or struggling. Abercrombie has overhauled its look to revamp its logo and downplay where it appears, and Juicy shuttered all its U.S. stores.