October 16, 2024, 12:58 pm | Read time: 3 minutes
Apple is not only one of the best-known companies in the world but also one of the most valuable companies in the world. Almost everyone knows the logo with the apple. But why does a tech giant of all companies have an apple as its logo – and a bitten apple at that?
The history of Apple began with the so-called Macintosh computer (Mac) in the late 1970s. Hardly anyone remembers that Apple helped the now omnipresent mouse to make its breakthrough as an input device in the 1980s. In the 1990s, Apple got bogged down in too many unsuccessful projects, got into financial difficulties, and even came close to bankruptcy. Today, the company is back and more successful than almost any other. And it likes to show it – with the Apple logo emblazoned on almost all its devices. But why a bitten apple?
The unique success story
Almost at the end of the 1990s, Apple worked its way back. One device in particular helped it to succeed. In the early 2000s, Apple invented the iPod and iTunes, not only revolutionizing the music industry, which was plagued by online piracy at the time but also setting in motion an unprecedented success story. The iPod is now history, but Apple’s success remains.
However, the most significant and most valuable Apple invention was neither the Mac computer nor the iPod. Instead, it was the iPhone, which was launched in 2007. It became the benchmark for the entire mobile phone industry and is considered the forefather of all modern smartphones. Behind all this success was the visionary Steve Jobs, who, together with Steve Wozniak and Ron Wayne, founded Apple as a garage company in Cupertino (California) in 1976.
From today’s perspective, the question of why Apple has a bitten apple in its logo is particularly interesting.
The fruity company name
The answer behind the company name is surprisingly banal. At the time, Steve Jobs was a vegetarian, even a frutarian, for a short time, so he mainly ate fruit. He also pruned apple trees on a communal farm in his spare time. This seems to have inspired him because shortly before founding the company, he is said to have threatened to call the company Apple unless someone suggested a more interesting name. He hoped this would stimulate the creativity of his colleagues. But it didn’t help – and so it became Apple.
However, there were also a few good reasons for the decision. Jobs is said to have argued that the name sounded friendly and took the edge off the computer theme. Moreover, in the future, the company would be listed in the telephone directory before Atari. The latter was one of its competitors at the time.
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A bitten apple as Apple’s logo
The original logo design for Apple initially looked completely different. It featured the philosopher Isaac Newton sitting under a tree with a shiny little apple above him. The whole thing was in black and white and looked more like a biblical drawing. But this homage to the philosopher who discovered gravity when the apple fell on his head was too complex and too small to reproduce well.
The Apple logo as we know it today was finally created by graphic designer Rob Janoff in 1977. According to Steve Jobs’ biography, he is said to have developed two versions – one with a whole apple and one with a bitten apple. In the end, the bitten apple was chosen so that it would not be mistaken for a cherry or tomato.
The bite mark is also an ironic reference to a “byte” (digital unit of measurement), which is pronounced the same as “bite.” Over the years, the logo first became colorful, later three-dimensional, and is now greatly reduced, usually in black or the respective color of the product on which it was applied.