Customer Spotlight: IHOP

First established in 1958 as International House of Pancakes, IHOP is a national restaurant chain known for their food, friendly atmosphere, and iconic blue A-frame buildings. While their namesake pancake dishes and breakfast specialties are perhaps most well-known, IHOP serves all manner of fare in over 1,500 restaurants — with locations in all 50 states.

The IHOP website extensively features the Helvetica Rounded Bold designs. While the Helvetica family consists of typefaces normally heralded as being beautifully neutral, the rounded strokes of its compatriot transform the otherwise unemotional design into one bursting with jovial liveliness. Headlines and subheads are set in the regular width of the typeface, while the site’s top navigation employs the condensed version. The use of white Helvetica Rounded Bold type upon a bright blue background provides the site additional levity – echoing the family friendly atmosphere of its locations, both type and image render the IHOP website warm and inviting.

Fonts.com features six rounded styles of Helvetica — bold, black, and bold condensed, each with a matching oblique. The entire breadth of the Helvetica family is available in 34 styles for Web use through the Fonts.com Web Fonts Service, and for desktop licensing as well.

Ryan Arruda is the Web Content Strategist at Monotype Imaging. Ryan holds a bachelor’s degree in film studies from Clark University, and an MFA in graphic design from RISD.