Pity the poor brand manager--they have to keep track of a million tiny details all the time. But there are times when it pays to sweat the small stuff--one of them being when your brand mark is literally carved in stone. Here in Seattle, the Wells Fargo head office is in a nice skyscraper downtown on 3rd Ave. And if you're at street level, and you happen to be just a touch obsessive-compulsive, you'll notice how the Wells Fargo logotype carved into the stone plaza in front of the building has TERRIBLE kerning. Maybe only one person in a thousand notices, but once you do, it starts to annoy, kind of like getting the Macarena stuck in your head. I'm guessing Wells Fargo has a few bucks invested in their corporate image, so it strikes me a bit surprising they'd let this go in such a permanent setting.

Another example--a local cruise company who has a reputation for going the extra mile when it comes to the details has unbelievably bad kerning for some of its ship names. You may ask, "so what?” but when the name is rendered in four foot high letters that you can see from half a mile away, badly executed kerning really shows. Does this impact their business? Probably not. But when you consider that their reputation is based on delivering a luxury experience, the very name of the ship is sending a subtle message that maybe the cruise isn't quite going to be everything that was promised.