By Noah Syverson, News Producer

The new logo is “pretty well set in stone” according to Nancy Rewis, Vice President of Marketing and Communications.

Rewis made the remark during Tuesday night’s SGA meeting as part of a presentation and Q&A session about Berry’s new branding campaign.

Viking Fusion had planned on Facebook livestreaming the meeting, but the administration requested for that not to occur.

When asked why the livestream had been scrapped, Rewis told Fusion after the meeting that there was concern that alumni would feel left out of the process.

“There is a whole alumni communications plan in the works,” she said, “and we wanted to make sure that this dialogue and conversation happened with the student audience and that the alumni didn’t feel that they were not being communicated with. Because there is a whole different plan for them.”

After Rewis presented background information on how the rebranding campaign came about–detailing previous Berry logo iterations and the historical factors that were integrated into the new imagery–Berry’s Director of Digital Marketing and Media, Cameron Jordan, went to the front to speak on the social media procedures surrounding the logo’s launch.

He admitted there were mistakes made on the part of his team regarding how it was initially presented.

“I think we [the marketing team] talked about it and we could have definitely communicated more before the holidays,” Jordan said. “We released that social icon that was the ‘circle’ right before the holiday break without much notice to anyone, it was just sort of dropped out in social media and it was one small piece of a much broader marketing strategy.”

Following Jordan’s segment, the floor was opened for student questions.

One student asked what the rebranding campaign had cost. Rewis said she couldn’t say, but did note that it was “nowhere near [the] $1 million” that she had seen some commenters on Facebook estimate.

Another student questioned why the decision had been made to go to the sans serif font on the logo, which the student said looked “childish and unprofessional.” Rewis told Fusion after the meeting that North Charles Street Design, the firm that was hired out for the rebrand, had more insight than what she could give.

However, she did say that the font was supposed to be complementary to the shield.

“I think the thinking behind the sans serif and pairing it with the heritage shield, which is iconic to the history and the mission of Berry College,” she said, “is that the idea behind it was it’s a complementary font to a more historic icon. So it’s modern meets heritage.”

Several students had concerns surrounding the lighter “energetic” blue that is heavily involved in the color palette.

Rewis said the color had tested well in focus groups throughout the rebranding process, especially in groups that were composed of prospective students and their parents.

She added that the “energetic” blue would primarily be used in admissions materials.

Jordan was asked about the post from Berry College’s Facebook page that detailed the “social media policy” that had been the grounds for deleting comments under some Berry posts. He told Fusion it didn’t take long for his team to reverse course.

“The decision last week was a one-day decision that we realized quickly was a bad decision,” Jordan said. “It was a decision that was made by the marketing team and administration as a whole, having a conversation about how to kind of try to get social posting back on track, understanding that we also have prospective students who are looking at that, and we want to build up excitement about what’s happening on campus.”

Jordan clarified that the only comments that were deleted were the ones added under off-topic posts.

“We didn’t delete any comments around the actual icon or the FAQ posts, except for several that we hid that were using heavy profanity,” he said. 

Another student asked why Berry Marketing professors weren’t more involved in the rebranding campaign. Rewis responded by saying that there were “quite a few” faculty members on the committee. 

Asked about the Change.org petition to change the logo, which at the time this story was published had 3,371 signatures, both Jordan and Rewis said that it had not been formally brought before them. Chris Kozelle, Director of Public Relations, told Fusion after the meeting that the petition was being “monitored.” 

 

“Change.org waits for it to get to a certain number, and then they notify us that ‘hey this is a legitimate petition, here’s what we have gathered,’” Kozelle said. “It’s something that we’re keeping an eye on.”  

Asked what would happen when Change.org notified them, Kozelle said, “We’d need to look and see what the procedure is.” 

In response to another student question, Jordan said the original circle-on-shield social media icon that had been the first source of controversy was “gone for good.” He admitted that it had been a mistake, and they had changed the social media icon to the form it is now. 

The Q&A portion of the meeting lasted around 30 minutes. Jordan and Rewis were also made available to students after SGA finished its other scheduled business. 

Rewis told Fusion she felt that the event had been a success. 

“I was very impressed by the students and the very informed questions that they asked,” she said, “I hope that they went away with more information, and if there are more questions, we want to answer them.” 

For more background on the logo change, visit this related story: 

Berry to launch new branding campaign in December

For Berry’s official logo Q&A page, visit this page:

New Logo Q&A