While the Lehigh Valley IronPigs have had one of the better selling logos in all of Minor League Baseball, general manager Kurt Landes is never one to stand still. In fact, the team's offices have a sign right inside the front door that reads "Standing still is falling behind." That approach led to a change in some of the team's uniforms for the upcoming season and beyond, but Landes and his staff were smart enough not to change what they refer to as the iconic pig logo.

While the traditional uniforms will be worn for the majority of games at home, the team will sport new looks for batting practice and games played at home on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.The Friday uniforms will coincide with a promotion the team will push for fans to wear black to the Friday night games at which post-game fireworks are a staple. The events will be known as a blackout and the team's uniforms will feature baseball's only all black uniform jersey and pants with numbering and lettering that features a reflective look. The hat features what is referred to as a molten pig logo that is dripping with molten metal coming out of a cauldron. Landes equates the fireworks displays to the rich history of steel in the Lehigh Valley."I'm really excited to see when you have the Friday night fireworks and the blackout, to me the fireworks are kind of like when you see someone taking a hammer to a piece of iron as it comes out of the fire and the sparks flying off of it, that's what our Friday night fireworks will be," explained Landes.For Saturdays, the team will sport a red uniform top with gray pants. The jersey has the word Pigs in script, with a strip of bacon running beneath the logo. The gray pants have custom bacon piping down each leg and the new Saturday hats feature a strip of bacon with the word IronPigs somewhat hidden in the bacon design.Sunday uniforms will pay homage to the team's connection to the Philadelphia Phillies and the fact that the Liberty Bell was hidden in Allentown during the Revolutionary War. The design features the classic Phillies powder blue color with the iconic pig logo on the jersey and a Liberty Bell logo on the cap. The cap logo features bacon as the crack in the bell and a baseball as the bell's clapper.The new batting practice caps feature the iconic pig, but with him turned slightly forward, which Landes predicts will be very popular.The process took nearly 10 months. Minor League Baseball rules require teams to notify them in the spring if they are considering a logo or uniform change for the following season. Landes gave that notice last March and explained that the team was investigating some new logos. From there, they started with logo design and had long, interesting conversations about every detail of the new designs."We wanted the colors to be just right and the thread colors and does the bacon strip look best on white or gray or blue pants? We talked about a strip of bacon and what it looks like and how it incorporates our name and we start having these goofy conversations that become very serious. You realize that we're arguing about how long the wavy strip of bacon should be underneath the word Pigs or we're talking about what part of the bacon should start at the top of the pant and work down. There are these really fun kind of conversations," laughed Landes.When asked about the black uniforms being too hot for players in the dead of summer, Landes explained that the new materials in uniforms are much cooler for players, no matter what the color. He has even had conversations with players about changes in uniform materials and what they prefer."We wouldn't have done that for a Sunday day game," admitted Landes. "Jerseys now are much, much different from what they were before as far as the material. These new jerseys with the new micro-tech fiber and so on, players would rather have black with this material than a red or blue with the old material."The team led into the introduction of the new designs with a campaign entitled #SmellTheChange, incorporating social networking to help draw interest in what the team was up to. They also launched SmellTheChange.com, which had a photo of sizzling strips of bacon until the uniform designs were introduced, after which the site turned into an opportunity for fans to order the new designs.The team also introduced a bacon scented scratch-and-sniff t-shirt with the bacon logo on the front.Landes noted that the sales of team merchandise have stayed pretty constant since their inception. Baseball rules prevent him from saying exactly where the team's sales rank, but noted that they are successful and the changes weren't motivated by any drop in merchandise sales, although the team certainly hopes for a spike with the new design options. In gathering input from his staff prior to the announcement."Literally, a third of the staff likes the Liberty Bell logo, and a third like the molten IronPig logo and a third of our staff just loves the bacon. The bacon design, people either really love it or are like 'uh, bacon?', which really brings out strong emotions one way or the other, which is what we always thought worked so well about the IronPigs name. When we first announced it, there was kind of either a love or hate, which really drew emotion," said Landes.