What’s in a Name? The Birth of a Transport Planning Brand.
Patn is ‘A branding agency for placemakers’. However, those who know William Seabrook will appreciate that he is much more than that. For years he has worked hard to deep dive into the built environment industry, holding thought-provoking round table discussions with like-minded professionals, arranging interesting site visits and organising the annual Patn Placemaking Festival, a day talking about placemaking and featuring ………… poetry. William likes to do things differently.
Patn was therefore the perfect place to start for a group of transport planners with no company name, brand or skillset to develop their own. We sat down with William to discuss Astute’s branding journey.
‘Hi William. At the beginning of this process, we arrived with a blank slate. No company name, no brand, no idea where to start. Is that unusual and how did it effect the brand development process?’
‘Actually, nobody arrives with a blank slate. Everybody has preconceptions about what they may want, or definitely what they don’t want.’
‘Importantly, we treat branding as a creative process that has a series of stages. The first is to really understand what the business is about. Why is the business being set up? Who are the people involved in the business? What threads link the team together? What are their aims and objectives, both personally and collectively? What are the company’s values and beliefs?’
‘The process resulted in us choosing Astute as our company name, which we selected alongside the descriptive words ‘Approachable’ and ‘Rigorous’ as they best reflect how we want to work for our clients.’
'Astute came about as a result of you being a team of very experienced transport planning specialists, meaning you can give considered early advice to your clients’.
‘This stage, which we call Bedrock, lays the foundations for the brand and results in the creation of a manifesto document that summarises what the business is all about. It must of course reflect the business and all of those involved.’
‘This was a challenging process during which you asked some fairly difficult questions. However, it really helped us to better understand our strengths and what sets us apart from our competitors. The process brought the management team more into alignment and helped us focus on how we should launch and grow. It also fed into the next stage, Toolkit.’
‘Toolkit is the second stage of the branding process, where we develop the brand identity and brand assets. We consider the competition, think about the business, build upon the first stage of work. We produce mood boards, different colour pallets, use different type fonts, logos and create options.’
‘What was clear very early on was that we were going to do things differently. It was agreed that we would be bold, clear and uncluttered. We liked that our colour pallet included Manchester Yellow and Brick, reflecting who we are and what we do. We love the logo, incorporating wheels and road markings. Importantly, we liked how the branding is flexible and that the creation of a logo will allow the business to grow.’
‘And then we appreciated the help that you provided, preparing a suite of document templates, business cards and other merchandise. Plus we moved onto the website design.’
‘Yes, the final stage of the process is Hub, where we develop digital assets including the website, email addresses and signatures. We spent a lot of time creating a bespoke website, which we continue to maintain for the business. We also arranged for photography to ensure consistency and a professional product’.
‘Well William, I can confirm that Team Astute are very happy with the end product. First impressions count, and we strongly believe that the branding reflects us and the Astute business, it has created interest in the market and helped us to reach our early goals for the business. So thank you very much for helping us along the journey.’
‘Thank you very much for engaging Patn with the task of creating your brand with you. It’s been a pleasure.’
William and Patn can be contacted at:
07766 314 275