Result: Avita Community Partners, a nonprofit organization, has a new identity that's being embraced at all levels, from directors to clients. Better yet, the new brand look they love is built to last, with a mark that will remain appropriate even if the organization continues its dynamic history.
The client's need: In 2007, Georgia Mountains Community Services decided it was time for a new identity. Its leaders felt the organizationÃs name focused too much on its geographic service area rather than its mission: assisting people with mental illness, developmental disabilities or addictive diseases. The organization had evolved from a state agency to an independent nonprofit and had changed names a few times along the way, but hadn't found a name that resonated with everyone. For that reason, many of its 30 offices were operating with their own identities, each with its own local flavor. This lack of a unified identity disguised the fact that these individual offices, spread across 13 counties, were all part of a larger organization.
How we did it:We started by learning all we could about this organization, from its history and structure to its goals and dreams.
"They spent several hours with our staff, not just the executive team," said Melanie Beard, a staff member at the organization's headquarters. "It gave me the feeling that they were really getting to know us before they did the work." The kickoff meeting filled an important priority for Beard. She didn't want a creative team to just cook up a "cool" name and brand mark. She wanted an identity that was relevant to the nonprofit's work.
Our discovery process revealed the organization's vision of changing people's lives by helping them overcome their difficulties. Based on this concept, we suggested a few possibilities for a new name. The client chose the name Avita, which comes from Latin for "a life."
Once the name was settled, we wrote a tag line that expresses the organization's mission: "Helping one, changing all."
Our next task was developing a visual identity. Our creative director, Holger Kappenstein, had a flash of inspiration. What began as a sketch on the back of his coffee cup sleeve one morning evolved into a mosaic pattern. A tile in the center, colored differently from the rest, would represent the person in need of Avita's help; the surrounding tiles would be the people and resources available to support that individual. Avita loved it.
That's when Holger went the extra kilometer (hey, he is Continental, after all). He thought that someday, he could make a real tile mosaic for the client's offices, so he bought a white bath tile and photographed it dozens of times. He set it at various angles to capture different patterns of reflection from the sun. The real tile mosaic was not to be, but Holger saw a use for his photographs. When he produced the Avita brand mark on the computer, he didn't use the design software to draw squares. Instead, he painstakingly inserted the photos he had taken, then colored each one, giving the mark depth and character that would be missing otherwise.
"I just love this logo," said Beard. "I think it's the best thing I've ever seen. It's forward-thinking. It's artistic. It meets our current needs, and it seems like it will meet our future needs, too."
The mark has reproduced well on shirts, as environmental design in offices, and on the Web. The new Web site wasn't designed by Point of Vision, but by another company that had a long-standing relationship with Avita. While we would have been happy to do the Web design, we're glad to know our brand work was solid enough that another designer could follow along with our creative concept. In fact, it's one of the reasons we urge companies to clearly lay out their brand's visual identity: A properly defined brand can be reproduced faithfully by anyone, inside or outside the organization, to deliver the consistency that builds a brand experience.
In the client's words: "You have taken so much into consideration in recommending our new name. I know we will never achieve consensus, but there is no doubt the recommendations for messaging have led us to something completely representative of who we are and what we stand for. You and your organization are so collaborative and I have enjoyed working with your team very much."
