Our long-time supporters may have noticed a change to Kidscape’s look this September. This was part of a long piece of work starting in January this year. At the same time, Kidscape underwent a strategic review, looking at our strengths, and we found that our particular niche was that we are the anti-bullying charity that helps. We had recognised the changing landscape, and wanted to ensure we were still available and relevant to our people: children and young people; parents and carers; teachers and professionals; and the people who support us.
Meridian West kindly provided pro bono support to Kidscape as we undertook our brand review. They surveyed parents and carers, finding that brand recognition was not as high as it could be, although those who did know of us had a positive impression. They also found demand for help through a bullying situation, which is something which we are placed to provide: if only everyone knew about us!
In the next step of our review, Kidscape spoke to our people about what they thought about Kidscape’s look and feel, and what they wanted from an anti-bullying charity. We chatted to children and young people, and parents and carers. We got together with teachers in a fringe session at a conference. We spoke to organisations we work with and long-term supporters. The same theme emerged again and again: that people wanted to find a path through it, to not feel so alone, and that they wanted help with bullying. It became apparent that our visual branding needed to change, that we needed a new look to better show what we do.
With support again from Meridian West, we took these findings to a small creative workshop of parents and children, who helped us to create a brief for a designer who could turn these feelings of our people into a new look and feel. At the workshop, the children came up with a fantastic idea: that what they wanted was a path through the maze of the playground.
We chose Chromatic Brands to design our new look, who kindly did the work at a significantly reduced rate. They developed a sophisticated and optimistic brand showing that we find that path through the maze. Follow the line of our Kidscape K through all twists and turns, getting you from one point to another, via our brightly coloured stops along the way! They also developed a new strapline for us, putting what we do into three little words: Help With Bullying.
When Simon Case from Chromatic showed us the concept art in an early meeting, the Kidscape team gasped. It was new, it was different… but we loved it! It felt right, it felt modern, and most importantly, it showed simply and visually what we do.
We’re grateful to Chromatic Brands and Meridian West for their support in this process, and we’re delighted by the outcome of this long and reflective process.
