Concept of the pictograms and their use: Pictograms have been part of Olympic design programs since they were first introduced at the 1964 Tokyo Games. The stylized figures easily communicate information to visitors and participants who have diverse language and cultural backgrounds. New pictograms were disigned for Mexico in 1968, Munich in 1972 and Moscow in 1980.

Montreal chose the use the Munich pictograms. The LAOOC first inquired about the purchase rights of the pictograms used at Munich and later Montreal, but found the price to be higher than the costs of commissioning new pictograms and chose instead to sponsor a competition.