SFU Community Trust / UniverCity
Discovery, Identity, Communication Design, Interactive
WHERE
If you haven’t ventured up Burnaby Mountain in a while you might be surprised to see how incredibly it has changed. UniverCity is the award-winning , sustainable and master-planned residential neighbourhood adjacent to Simon Fraser University. Since its inception a decade ago, it has become an international beacon for urban planners searching for an example of long-term sustainable community planning.
Our task was to examine the UniverCity name and evolve the identity then create a new website and other materials to appeal to all levels of community residents, developers, investors and government.
IDEAS
Following a number of workshop sessions on defining the communication goals and messages for the Trust, we developed a complete Brand Essence for UniverCity. This became the establishing work to lead us to naming options and, within a mandate to preserve as much of the equity of the original identity, establish a new and more vibrant colour palate and a completely revised wordmark.
WORK
We developed graphic standards and integrated the new brand look into all printed communication materials, and a new website. Additionally, we devised several unique direct marketing initiatives to get the attention of the development community, and get developers the tools they need to start talking about UniverCity in their own sales materials in a consistent manner. To respect the sustainable mandate of the community, all printed materials were printed on recycled, carbon neutral stock and printed at Hemlock Printers, one of the most environmentally-friendly forward printers in Canada.
The new site had to appeal to all target users on different levels and integrate marketing and sales tools such as image libraries for real estate developers. Areas of functionality such as open forums that in the past had caused problems were removed in favour of top-down blog-like content and information delivery. A simple to use CMS back-end has revitalized the administrative staff’s enthusiasm for posting, and has even had an impact on the communication avenues now available to them.
Initial feedback on the identity overall has been very well received by all. New wayfinding and more vibrant signage has dramatically improved navigation through the area and the overall look and appeal of street-level signs and banners. Feedback from the development community on waste-saving development calls-for-proposals and attention-getting, breakthrough marketing has helped the Trust immensely and solidified their leading position.
“The SFU Community Trust has been working with Industrial Brand for the past two years and we have found them to be an accomplished and highly professional firm that has shown a strong commitment to our organization’s needs. We have found Industrial Brand staff to be responsive and willing to think broadly and creatively about the projects we have engaged them with, and have found their outcomes to be consistently above our expectations.” - Jonathan Tinney, Director of Community Development, UniverCity
Launch site: www.univercity.ca
