TITLE: Title
Carrboro Branding and Marketing
PURPOSE: The purpose of this agenda item is to present the findings of the Branding study to the Board of Aldermen.
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DEPARTMENT: Economic and Community Development
CONTACT INFORMATION: Annette D. Stone, AICP Economic and Community Development Director 919 918 7319
INFORMATION: Cities, Towns and Counties across the State and Country are recognizing the value of branding a community. Branding is the art of aligning what you want people to think about your community with what people actually do think about your community. Branding is communicating through visuals and words that tell the unique story, in Carrboro's case, about this special place.
The Board of Aldermen recognized the need to re-brand the Town (there is an existing visual that is used throughout Town signage) in several planning documents. First, in the 2006 RTS report, "Creating Carrboro's Economic Future," the study points out the need to brand the community in order to communicate to new and re-locating businesses why Carrboro is an attractive place to start a business. In the 2008 Local Living Economy Task Force Recommendations, the Task Force recommended developing a brand, stating "The consistent use and promotion of a Town graphic and tagline provides a visual hook to uniquely identify those businesses, programs, events, products, people and the physical environment that define our community. Properly developed, this graphic and tagline could embody the unique traits and characteristics of the community (i.e. quality, successful, unique, healthy, committed, beautiful, funky, leading edge, fun, historic, active.)".
The Town officially began this process of branding last year with the selection of The Splinter Group to guide a community conversation and develop a process for stakeholder engagement. In the past year, staff and the consultant have meet with Town advisory boards, attended community events, held public input ...
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