The Earthquakes hired the Portland-based advertising firm Fiction more than a year ago to design a new branding logo and unique "mark" for the team, Fiction principal owner Scott Petersen said.
The team, which played its first match in 1974 at Spartan Stadium in San Jose, will use the distinctive new logo on players' uniforms and elsewhere, Petersen said.
The Earthquakes will reveal their new logo at a ceremony starting at 5:30 p.m. today at the San Pedro Square Market in downtown San Jose, said team spokesman Brad Brenner.
John Fisher and Oakland A's baseball team owner Lew Wolff co-own the Earthquakes, which are affiliated with Major League Soccer.
Petersen said the new, permanent logo will become associated with the Earthquakes like other iconic team symbols have, such as the "A's" for Wolff's Oakland Athletics and the interlocking "NY" for the New York Yankees.
"They never had a mark that stood the test of time," Petersen said of the Earthquakes. "They wanted to have a mark that looks like it was there at (the team's) inception."
Petersen, who declined to reveal the logo prior to today's ceremony, said Earthquakes executives worked on its design with him and his company, which has done design projects for Adidas and Nike running shoes and Apple computers.
Adidas, the official outfitter for MLS, will be manufacturing the players' new uniforms, Petersen said.
The Earthquakes' first regular season MLS game will be at home on March 15 against Real Salt Lake at Buck Shaw Stadium in San Jose, according to the team's website.
