REI Logo

REI LogoREI Logo PNG

REI, short for Recreational Equipment Inc. is America’s largest outdoor retailer specializing in outdoor gear and products for active sports and hobbies. The company was founded in 1938 and today has more than 170 retail stores nationwide and an online portal that allows you to shop from any corner of the world. In addition to retail, the company provides educational outdoor lectures and organizes camping trips.

Meaning and history

REI Logo history

Recreational Equipment Inc. was founded by Lloyd and Mary Anderson in 1938 in Seattle, Washington. The family was passionate about mountaineering and initially imported ice axes from Austria for personal use. This is how the hobby grew into a super successful business.

Over the following decades, the company grew and developed, establishing itself as the site with the most reliable and high-quality equipment. Already in the 1970s, REI stores became the number one destination for serious mountain expeditions.

Today REI is the largest American chain of stores of equipment for tourism and outdoor recreation. The network includes 170 retail stores, an online portal, and a service for the sale of equipment through catalogs.

In the catalogs of the company a large selection of a wide variety of goods for hiking and sports. Here you can find literally everything from fitness and running equipment to yachting and mountaineering. Among other things, the brand is famous not only for its attentive attitude to customers and employees but also for its regular campaigns to protect the environment.

Despite the fact that today the specialization of the store has significantly expanded, REI is proud of its history and remembers where it all began. For example, every customer can touch the symbol of the company, because the door handles in all stores of the chain are made in the shape of ice axes.

196? – 1975

REI Logo 196s

One of the first logos of Recreation Equipment Inc. featured a bold and sharp composition, based on a laconic geometric depiction of mountain peaks, made with a zig-zag line, a solid black pine tree, drawn in triangles, and an uppercase lettering, executed in a modern sans-serif typeface. All of these elements you can still find today on the REI logo.

1975 – 1982

REI Logo 1975

The redesign of 1975 followed the official rename of Recreational Equipment Inc. into REI. The mountain peaks on the logo were redrawn in straighter and sharper lines, the pine tree grew larger and gained a more interesting geometry, while the REI wordmark was completely rewritten. Now it was an extra-heavy and modern inscription set in a custom sans-serif typeface with softened contours of brutal capitals. The composition was accompanied by the “Co-op” tagline in an extended type.

1983 – 2015

REI Logo 1983

Another version of the REI logo was introduced in 1983. The lines of the mountains grew thicker, and the Pine tree was now standing straight, with more triangles forming it. The tagline was completely removed from the badge, while the main inscription got bolder lines with straight angles and cuts.

2015 – Today

REI Logo

The redesign of 2015 has united the two previous versions of the REI badge, keeping the geometry of the one from 1975, and the sharpness of the one from 1983. The refined logo looks super shark and brutal, expressing professionalism and excellence in each of its strokes.

Font and color

REI Emblem

The heavy uppercase lettering from the primary logo of the REI company is executed in a stylized geometric sans-serif typeface with massive bars and distinctive cuts of shapes.

As for the color palette of the REI visual identity, it has never been changed from the traditional combination of black and white, which symbolized strengths professionalism and confidence.

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