ADAA BRANDING OVERHAUL
My client for this project was ADAA (Agility Dogs Association Australia), a not-for-profit that helps train dogs for agility. Agility helps dogs live longer, gain better movement, and improves their mental capabilities.
CLIENT
BRIEF
ADAA asked us to create new brand guidelines, website pages and magazine spreads. Accompanying the new branding would be items such as t-shirts and dog toys that would help the company gain recognition. Their aims for the future (as listed in the brief) were to grow their club, improve their communications strategy, and become internationally recognised. They requested that we also be aware of their upcoming 25th Anniversary when working on their branding.
As shown by their website images, ADAA's current target audience is women, aged 60+. As ADAA hopes to become internationally recognised, grow their clubs and develop a better communications strategy, it was important for them to begin targeting a younger, more influential target audience, that weren't at risk of becoming physically unable to participate in agility training.
According to market research, the current pet owner is growing younger, as well as growing a deeper concern for their pet's health and diet. The current healthy living trend has also affected the pet industry, with owners becoming interested in ‘natural’ foods (such as Raw pet food) and activities that boost the life experience of their pets. Therefore, the target audience for this campaign is women, aged 25 -35, who are active, fit and after a health-focused lifestyle for both themselves and their pets.
The big idea to encompass the overall project was that:
'Agility is like Pilates and Yoga for dogs'.
The reasoning behind this decision was that both activities boost a subject's mental and physical well being and lead to a better lifestyle for most individuals. The branding was designed around this idea, in order to better communicate with the target audience and attract their attention.
THE TARGET AUDIENCE & BIG IDEA
PROJECT PROCESS
Their old logo was a little outdated. To help ADAA compete with other pet charity organisations, I recreated the logo from scratch, bearing in mind that it would likely be used by non-designers, who may not have knowledge of concepts such as spacing and colour theory.
The design decisions I made, such as leaving a box around the logo, and writing out the abbreviation in full underneath were influenced by usage. I also made sure to create black and white versions, as colour printing can be expensive for not-for-profit organisations.
I used dynamic lines and shapes throughout the logo to reflect the nature of agility as an active pastime. I used filled-in shapes to help the logo stand out and remain visible from a distance.
As per ADDA's wishes, I created a secondary logo specifically for their 25th anniversary. In this version, the logo icon is smaller, and the text bigger to put emphasis on the brand's legacy.
The fonts I used throughout the project were Poppins sans and Railway. Both fonts are from Google and therefore, free for the organisation to use for commercial use. I used a bold font for titles to allow for clarity and comprehension.
The colour palette I chose was designed to echo the original agility colours, although using more complimentary shades, and extra colours. I made this decision due to ADAA's wish of competing internationally, and with recognisable colours. The green and yellow are 'Australian’, but also are used to represent sand and dirt. In addition to these, I added a maroon brown colour to represent ground, as well as to invoke a further nature and health based appeal to the target audience. The blue and off-white colours are secondaries, and represent sky, water and clouds.
The other peripherals requested were to design a magazine spread, sample pages for a new website and other promotional material. I designed these to be simple and easy to use (such as the wix-based website) for non-designers. My peripherals were branded shirts (for international competition) and on-the-counter freebies (such as bouncy dog balls) in order to attract attention and foster brand recognition.
