Dominican Republic’s ‘country brand’ fiasco

Santo Domingo.- The logo that identifies the Dominican Republic’s “country brand” strategy has become one of the main topics of conversation on social networks. Just the design cost the country a cool US$552,000.

The controversy has arisen due to accusations of plagiarism of the logo, which has been supported by a Russian creative named Ivan Bobrov, who claims to have produced the brand in 2014.

Bobrov says that this logo was not sold or made available to any intermediary, so he was surprised by reports that the Dominican Republic would use it as its logo in its international promotion strategy.

This is the complete message that the creative has published on the Instagram social network:

Hello:) I wish I could speak Spanish today. I am the author of this logo, K from 2014, and a person originally from a small town in Russia. I have dozens of direct messages right now from good people in the Dominican Republic and the same number of emails. First of all, thank you very much to all the people who sent me the information and supported me in this case, that means a lot.

Second, I have never participated in that country branding process and the logo was never sold in any stock or galleries (I never did that with any of the logos I have made).

I’m still not sure how to react in this situation, my life is already quite complex in these crazy times of the pandemic. But when I get more information, I’ll offer an update here. Thanks again and stay safe. “