Irish Cancer Society Branding
How I lead brand advocacy and graphic design for one of Ireland’s top NGOs
Project Overview
I had the privilege of playing a pivotal role as lead designer in the brand development, and subsequent rebranding project of the Irish Cancer Society, a charity dedicated to ensuring no one in Ireland faces a cancer diagnosis alone. Working closely with the design agency Red Dog, the team undertook a multi-year plan to understand our target audience, and generate our new look to resonate with our 10-year plan, further developing our cohesive visual and verbal communication strategy.
Challenges
The primary challenges of the rebrand were to:
- ensure seamless transition from one set of guidelines to the next
- while maintaining work output
- and minimising waste paper and merchandise.
To address these issues we generated cheat-sheets for the team in both visual and communication shortcuts and ran team workshops to ensure everyone knew not to use old branding on new materials.
Research
The communications research into messaging and a 10-year marketing strategy was undertaken by MCCQ Agency in Dublin, before being handed to Red Dog for initial development of a new logo that was reflective of this.
The logo which we in the Irish Cancer Society eventually settled on, was a much more modern take on the existing mark, without moving too far from where the audience would feel comfortable they were still the same charity they had grown to trust.
The new logo changed to a clean outline reminiscent of celtic knots, a brighter brand blue and yellow, and using the more geometric ES Peak sans serif font where Calibri and Futura had been used before.
Once logos and colours had been signed off by management, we were able to build guidelines and briefs for refreshing old campaigns and giving internal logos a new, cohesive look to bring all logos and banners back into a future-proofed format.
The logo which we in the Irish Cancer Society eventually settled on, was a much more modern take on the existing mark, without moving too far from where the audience would feel comfortable they were still the same charity they had grown to trust.
The new logo changed to a clean outline reminiscent of celtic knots, a brighter brand blue and yellow, and using the more geometric ES Peak sans serif font where Calibri and Futura had been used before.
Once logos and colours had been signed off by management, we were able to build guidelines and briefs for refreshing old campaigns and giving internal logos a new, cohesive look to bring all logos and banners back into a future-proofed format.
Design
I took the initial set of samples from Red Dog and expanded on them as a kind of glance-sheet for all new visual work. If it could sit comfortably beside all other artwork, and I judged it as appropriate, and could be added to the sheet.
To that end, I defined a short list of previously-unwritten guidelines, which contained:
To that end, I defined a short list of previously-unwritten guidelines, which contained:
- No more than 2 overlapping shapes
- Stick to 4 colours per campaign
- One of these colours must be either the new brand yellow or blue
- Define the campaign colours before starting and add them to a single database resource to be treated as the single source of truth
Feedback
Overall, the rebrand was a massive success, both internally and externally. The project (almost 5 years from start to finish) was happily received as a much-needed new look that gave a more modern and digital-first focus.
This coincided nicely with new strategies for social media, video and communication, allowing for a full 360 pivot in the team's outreach, and thus felt like a new set of clothes across all channels. and a fresh wave of enthusiasm and energy within the team.
The team's primary concern was the transition period where items currently in production either needed to be adjusted or redesigned, and longer, less regularly ordered, more niche booklets had to be slowly cycled through before new copies could be ordered.
This coincided nicely with new strategies for social media, video and communication, allowing for a full 360 pivot in the team's outreach, and thus felt like a new set of clothes across all channels. and a fresh wave of enthusiasm and energy within the team.
The team's primary concern was the transition period where items currently in production either needed to be adjusted or redesigned, and longer, less regularly ordered, more niche booklets had to be slowly cycled through before new copies could be ordered.
Next Steps
I left the Irish Cancer Society a few months after the brand refresh began implementation, but not before compiling a sheet of current brand material, and organising them in complexity, exposure, and ease of replacement. This gave a clear roadmap of what items to change, and their order of priority.
- Social Media and website banners could be changed quickly and without fuss.
- Print banners would take more lead time but varied based on campaign.
- Printed fundraising booklets, informational videos and photography would take much longer to cycle out, but would provide clearly defined progress for the weeks ahead.
