After widespread consultation, the new brand identity was launched in March 2004 to coincide with the start of the university's annual undergraduate recruitment drive and with the publication of the university prospectus, annual report, and fact book which was rebranded as ‘know us’.
‘We wanted to make as big an impact as we could,’ Hiles says. ‘But cost was an obvious factor.’ A phased roll-out was essential to get most value from the £100,000 budget. Phase one was the identity's launch and phase two involved the development of templates that could be cost-effectively applied to re-branding all other materials in due course.
It was important not to thrust the new identity onto people but for all stakeholders to understand it, Gifford adds. So Blast produced a booklet to introduce the identity and outline the thinking behind it, which unfolded into a poster carrying the words 'Explore us' and was fly-posted across the campus on launch day. The launch was also supported by a teaser campaign involving computer screensavers, and ads on local buses.
Branding is all about extracting the essence of an organisation and giving back to the people within that organisation something to aspire to.
Blast held back from creating design guidelines until after the identity's launch. ‘Typically, you are asked for an identity and brand guidelines all at once,’ Gifford explains. ‘We believe guidelines are more useful if they take into account how people use an identity once it has been launched. The experiences gained through applying it are invaluable and provide inspiration for its future creative use.’
