Rebranding efforts are common in the credit union world these days, but peek behind the curtain at cooperatives such as Los Alamitos, Calif.-based Southland Credit Union, which unveiled a brand-new logo and tagline last week, and it's easy to see how complicated, demanding and important it can be to rebrand a credit union.
Southland, which has $749 million in assets and about 59,000 members, made two big changes. First, it scrapped its palm-trees-and-mountain silhouette logo, replacing it with one featuring a single palm tree against a blue and orange background. Second, it rolled out a new tagline — "Your future made easy." It was the credit union's first rebranding effort in 15 years, and the credit union said it plans to have the new logo and tagline on all of its communications starting Oct. 1.
The move highlights the variety of ways credit unions go about revamping themselves, and two of Southland's leaders gave CU Times the inside scoop on why the credit union rebranded, how the process played out and even what it cost. Here are four things credit unions can learn.
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1. Don't just change the logo because it's "ugly." Logos and other design elements have to reflect the credit union's current goals — not just look good.
"A year ago we had a strategic planning session with our board, and one of our strategic initiatives or priorities was that we needed to get younger," Southland President and CEO Tom Lent said.
"We wanted to make sure we were still relevant to the younger generation. That was kind of the impetus behind who is Southland, what do we stand for, what is our brand promise?" he added.
2. People actually do care what the logo looks like. Southland SVP of Marketing and Financial Services Matt Herrick said focus groups revealed a lot.
"Going in, we thought our logo was pretty good and we thought our logo was relevant; we just wanted to validate it. But what we learned — especially with the millennial audience — is, interestingly enough, they said they loved the Southern California vibe… but they actually felt our logo was dated." Some focus group members said the old logo was dark; others felt the font was old, he noted.
The old Southland CU logo. That feedback was like gold to Herrick. "We wanted to incorporate the things they liked about the Southland name, which was the Southern California vibe, the palm trees, the relaxing environment that they actually said they wanted in a financial institution, but with more vibrant, fresh colors," he explained. "We actually heard from the younger audience that the teal and orange colors that we chose in the logo was really relevant with that group. They loved those colors."
3. Give it time (and money). Changing a credit union's image should be a thoughtful, deliberate investment. For Southland, the logo and tagline change was in the works for about a year. Doing the focus groups took several months, as did choosing an agency. Herrick the credit union budgeted roughly $400,000, including agency fees and new signage, Herrick said. "We budgeted a fairly sizable number for this because if, knowing we're going to change our logo is a possibility, you have to do branch signage and really reprint everything."
New Southland CU logo. 4. Shop around for an agency. When Southland decided to hire outside help, a committee developed a scoring model to rate four agencies that specialized in credit unions. That helped prioritize certain things, but it also revealed wide disparities when it came to agency fees.
"One proposal was 10 times another, as far as cost," Lent said. "We did not select the ones that were 10 times larger."
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