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The Modern Brand Co. was officially founded in 2007. Our central mission has never changed from day one: we are here to deliver strategic brand consulting coupled with results-oriented creativity to small businesses and non-profit agencies. More than an advertising agency, The Modern Brand Company is a brand consultancy. |
See, every company, big or small, has a personality. And, every company has a target audience. The key to branding is understanding what you have to offer your audience. Then relaying that offering in a clear, concise manner that is both relatable and relevant. It’s not smoke and mirrors… it’s a relationship. If your brand is properly positioned and well supported, your audience will buy your products, attend your events, donate to your cause, and maybe even follow you on twitter if that’s important to you. |
1305 Second Avenue North, Suite 103, Birmingham, AL 35203
205-705-3777
Info@themodernbrand.com
Copyright © 2013
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| What’s With the Shoes? |
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| Core Services |
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| Blue Canoe Branding |
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| Magic City Half Marathon |
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| Television and Radio Samples |
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| Smokefree Alabama Bar Kit |
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| Dyron's Lowcountry Branding |
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| Spotswood Sansom & Sansbury Branding |
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| Awards: Yep, we've got those. |
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| Champions for Health Branding |
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| Agency History |
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| Birmingham365.org Branding |
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| The Braintrust Consulting Group |
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| Principal: Michael Bell |
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| Omicron Delta Kappa |
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| Pardon Our Apostrophes |
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| Athletic Club Alabama |
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| Principal: Bradford Kachelhofer |
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| What Are You Reading? |
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| Pee Wee's Pawn Shop Branding |
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| Creative Director: Jacob Schwartz |
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| Recycle Alabama Branding |
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| MIX Branding |
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| Seeking Interns |
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| Landology Website |
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| Contact Us |
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| PMP? Yeah you know me. |
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What’s With the Shoes? Why shoes on an agency website? Well, its not as crazy as it may seem. At The Modern Brand Co., we believe that clients should fit our agency and we should fit them... just like the perfect pair of shoes. . For us, that means that we seek clients who represent a challenge. We look for client situations where we can provide value and where our skills can make an impact. It's not common for an advertising agency to turn down a paying client, but we do more than our fair share. That willingness to turn down clients who are not a good fit, has led us to many long-time clients who do fit.
A few of our longtime clients include: Alabama Environmental Council Athletic Club Alabama Blue Canoe Properties Briantrust Consulting Group Catholic Family Services The Cultural Alliance of Greater Birmingham Dyron's LowCountry Restaurant Freedom Court Reporting Jefferson County Health Department Landology Liberty Park Joint Venture Media For Health On Target Leading Satterfield's Restaurant Smart Home Solutions Stone Hollow Farmstead
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Core Services
These are some of the things we like to do. But if you don’t see something you need, let’s talk. When you’re our client, we work with you to figure out what’s best for your organization. Whether you need help getting started or want to raise your profile, we customize our services for you.
Branding:
Creative Services:
Experiential:
Public Relations:
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Blue Canoe Branding Blue Canoe Properties is a property management company that wanted to be a little different. They wanted to be friendly and approachable. So, we created the name and the identity to match their personality. But, it is more than just a fun name. The canoe represents the synergy between the property owner, the tenant, and the property managers. Just like a canoe, there has to be balance between the three or the boat will rock and no one will ever get anywhere. Ultimately, the brand included the naming, logo development, signage, website design, collateral including folders, business cards, letterhead, and notecards, and tenant merchandise such as hats and t-shirts.
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Magic City Half Marathon
Last year, we were a part of the Ruben Studdard Celebration Weekend while we were sponsoring the Champions for Health 5K. So, we were especially excited this year when they came to us for help rebranding their signature event, the Half Marathon. After looking at the various icons that represent our great city, we decided on the famous Magic City sign that was formerly located above the train tracks on the way into Birmingham. The logo will be featured on race t-shirts, commemorative medals for finishers, and more.
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Television and Radio Samples We have produced numerous television and radio spots for our various clients. We have done everything from long-form informational videos to short animations for websites. You can visit our YouTube channel to see some of our favorites. We work with Jason Hamric as our director and editor for the majority of our work. His ability to bring our ideas to life and capture the vision for a video project is unparalleled.
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Smokefree Alabama Bar Kit
After the city of Birmingham passed a new smokefree ordinance, we were tasked with creating an activation kit that could be distributed to all of the bars in the city. It needed to be something fun and engaging, but useful and educational. So, we created the smokefree bar box. Each hand-made wooden box contained t-shirts for staff to wear, coaster to be placed around the bar, signage for non-smoking areas, a testimonial book of smokefree stories, magic city matchless gum, and a custom designed, Electra bottleopener made by local Alabama metal artists.
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Dyron's Lowcountry Branding Dyron's Lowcountry Restaurant is nestled in the heart of Crestline Village in Mountain Brook, AL. When Dyron came to us, he had just purchased the building and he was embarking on his first restaurant project. We created the entire brand from the logo and the menus to the color schemes and the artwork in the restaurant space. Over the last two years, we have grown with Dyron and evolved his brand into private wine labels, advertising campaigns, and supporting collateral. Dyron's is truly an example of building a complete brand experience from the ground up. Every detail down to the way the servers dress was planned and executed according to the brand plan. |
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Spotswood Sansom & Sansbury Branding
The lawyers at Spotswood Sansom & Sansbury were facing a very common issue among law firms. They were blending in. When they hired The Modern Brand Co., their biggest question was "How do we position ourselves?" After a half day branding session with the key partners and associates, one thing became very clear... this is a very strategic law firm. They are creative lawyers who deal with complex business litigation issues. They think beyond each individual case and often deal with the long-term legal ramifications of litigation outcomes. They have to think not only of their clients, but of entire industries that will be affected by their outcomes. After we got to the core of their positioning, the challenge was to find a visual representation of strategic thinking. Thats when we came up with the idea to use the Game of Risk. Think about it, its a game of world domination. The parallels are obvious. The game requires strategic thinking, long-term planning, and, quite literally, the mitigation of risk. Which is exactly what Spotswood Sansom & Sansbury offers to their clients. Working with Jason Hamric on the photos, Lilla Hood on the design, Patrick Masterson on the letterpress cover, and Communication Arts for the printing, this project took a village, but we're really proud of the results. |
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Awards: Yep, we've got those. At The Modern Brand Co., we don't put a whole lot of stock in the awards we have won. In fact, we would much rather do work that accomplishes the true goals of our clients. For us, it is not about winning a piece of Lexan plastic. But, despite our best efforts, along the way we have managed to win quite a few. (Some of which we didn't even know we were nominated for.) If awards are important to you, here are a few that sit on our shelf... Gold and Silver Addys in multiple categories, Peak Award for Best New Agency of The Year, Peak Award for Best Account Executive of the Year, Peak Award for Best Production Specialist of the Year, 10 Award for Public Relations Professional of the Year, and the Young Professional "Overachiever of The Year" Award (which we really just like because of the name.) |
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Champions for Health Branding
Best to begin at the beginning. In late 2009, we helped a few of our favorite clients write a portion of a grant. By the spring of 2010, we found ourselves part of a national initiative called Communities Putting Prevention to Work. With 19 other partners in Jefferson County, The Modern Brand coordinated a complex media buy and marketing plan focused on preventing obesity and tobacco use. It's our big ongoing project and you should check it out. |
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Agency History The Modern Brand Co. was founded October 15, 2007. The founding partners all worked together at a large agency in Birmingham, but we saw an opportunity. We saw a need in the marketplace. There was no one delivering high-quality brand strategy and marketing advice to small businesses and non-profits. At the larger agency, we turned away quite a few potential clients because they could not afford the overhead and the high hourly fees of that larger agency. We knew that these people needed help, and we knew that we could deliver it at a price they could afford. So, we set out on our own, hung our shingle at 1305 Second Avenue North, and The Modern Brand Co. was born. Since that time, we have worked with over 100 small businesses and over 20 non-profits. We strive to keep our overhead low and our staff as small and as nimble as possible. We don't want to be a big agency that has multiple departments. We want to provide high-quality, results oriented branding to our clients while maximizing budgets of any size. |
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Birmingham365.org Branding Birmingham365.org is a community events calendar powered by The Cultural Alliance of Greater Birmingham. As a huge supporter of the arts and culture in our region, The Modern Brand Co. has been working with the Cultural Alliance since the very first day we opened our doors in 2007. We have created brand identities for several different programs, but Birmingham365.org may be our favorite (don't tell the other programs). The main reason is that it was a much needed tool for our community. Finally through Birmingham365, we have a central source for information and calendar listings. The Cultural Alliance partnered with the Birmingham Business Alliance and the Greater Birmingham Convention and Visitors Bureau to combine calendars. The Modern Brand Co. created the name for the website, designed the logo, designed the graphics for the website, and we are continuing to promote the website through online and print media. |
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What kind of marketing firm would we be without a Facebook page. Find us and like us. We'll return the favor by sharing intimate details about ourselves like what we had for lunch or what band is being featured in the office on any given day. |
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The Braintrust Consulting Group
The Braintrust Consulting Group provides training courses in Agile project management. If you aren't in software development, that probably doesn't mean a whole lot to you. But Brain Rabon, founder of Braintrust, is one of only 150 Certified Agile trainers in the whole world. He books training seminars all over the world and teaches a very complicated project management methodology. To make his subject matter more user friendly and easier to understand, we created an infographic that explains the whole process. You are probably wondering about the pigs and chickens, but those are common icons in the Agile, Scrum world. Chickens represent the stakeholders in a project and pigs represent the project team.
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Principal: Michael Bell Michael leads our brand strategy services. With a background in sports marketing and over 10 years in the agency world, Michael has guided local, regional, and national brands through strategic positioning, planning and product launches. His specialties include brand evaluations, brand roadmaps, sales messaging, and long-term marketing plans. If a 40-page, detailed brand recommendation is what you’re looking for, he’s your guy. And he’s also great at writing clever headlines and catchy tags that will make your audience take notice. 205-705-3775 |
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Omicron Delta Kappa
Omicron Delta Kappa is the National Leadership Honor Society for college students throughout the United States. But, with 30 Circles (universities) spread across the country, their brand had become diluted and inconsistent. They hired The Modern Brand Co. to assess their member base and create a new identity including a complete graphics standards package that can be provided to each Circle.
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Pardon Our Apostrophes Like us, you have probably had a client, teacher, boss, mother, et al., with a pet peeve so severe that everyone within a 10-mile radius knows not to step over that line. Michael had the client who DESPISED anything purple. Outright rejected any creative featuring said color. So now, he is a stickler for asking clients what they do not like before asking what they do. Brad had the boss who instilled in her an instant, visceral reaction to the foot mark used where an apostrophe belongs. But true typography is hard to get control of on a website. What looks right on this computer may not render the same way on yours. So, if Brad is writing something for the website, you should know that she is going out of her way to avoid possessives and contractions. Surely, one or two will get past her. So forgive me, Clay Nordan, for I have sinned. |
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Athletic Club Alabama In 2010, The Huntsville Athletic Club was purchased by a new ownership group. In addition to a major building renovation, they recognized the need for a new brand as well. They hired The Modern Brand Co. to execute a full brand equity review, which included surveys with members, non-members, and previous members. What we found was that the curent brand equity was actually better than the new owners originally thought. However, there was a need to refresh the overall image of the brand. Rather than throw out thirty years of established equity, we created a brand roapmap to change the name to Athletic Club Alabama. This new brand retains the equity of the Athletic Club, but subtly suggests that the club is being renewed. Renewed into something larger and grander than it was before. It is no longer just the Huntsville Athletic Club, it is now the premier club in the state. Working with Mathieu Schmutzler of T.B.I.B Creative, we designed a new logo to reflect the new brand and made sure to include the founding date of 1973 in the primary mark.
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Principal: Bradford Kachelhofer Brad leads our creative efforts. She steers the implementation of every campaign we produce. Before co-founding Modern Brand, Brad spent twelve years with Southern Progress where she did everything from write articles and produce TV segments, to create custom publications for Kroger, Keebler, and many more. Her specialties include results-oriented campaign concepts, copywriting, and overall creative direction. She knows how to take those 40 pages of strategy and turn it into a clear, concise message that can be delivered in a memorable yet relevant concept. 205-705-3777 |
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What Are You Reading? Sheepishly, I admit that I have not read a book on paper in weeks because I am so enjoying the terrible convenience of my iPad with gorgeous case by TechCandy. Convenient, on the one hand, because I can read in the dark and download books immediately. Terrible, on the other, because shopping iTunes or the Kindle store is leading to lots of impulse purchases each time I finish a novel in a series, or get a suggestion from a friend. But don't let that stop you from sending me recommendations. In the current rotation: 1. Unfamiliar Fishes by Sarah Vowell, non-fiction about missionaries to Hawaii, seriously funny, seriously 2. The Murder in the Museum of Man by Alfred Alcorn, a mystery novel with fantastic new vocabulary words: coprolites, pongicidal 3.The New How by Nilofer Merchant, business reading recommended by the Harvard Business Review, the magazine that I can't believe I ever lived without |
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Pee Wee's Pawn Shop Branding Now this was a fun project. One of our long-time clients recently inherited Pee Wee's Pawn Shop in Pelham. Being a savvy business owner who understands the power of branding, she asked The Modern Brand to create a new logo and identity for Pee Wee's. She wanted to capture the Las Vegas style of over-the-top glitz and cheesiness, but she also wanted to incorporate a tribute to her grandfather- Pee Wee. So, working with local illustrator Chris Garrison, we created a new brand for Pee Wee's. |
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Creative Director: Jacob Schwartz When we first met Jacob Schwartz, he was running his own design shop called AirRaid Designs. After a year of partnership between Modern Brand and AirRaid, we finally convinced him to join our team full time. Now Jacob serves as our director of all things creative. He brings a unique perspective to our team and has the rare ability to design in multiple styles depending on the client needs. In addition to being an extremely talented designer, Jacob is also a graffiti artist from way back (once sponsored by Redbull), an illustrator, and a tattoo enthusiast.
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Recycle Alabama Branding Recycle Alabama is an cooperative partnership between the Alabama Environmental Council, The Jefferson County Health Department, and the Alabama Department of Environmental Management. The main goal of the initiative is to increase both awareness of recycling and increase participation. When they came to The Modern Brand Co., they were seeking a "fun" but effective brand that would make people feel good about recycling in a way that would be memorable. We created a brand centered around tie-dye. We created a logo and all of the supporting brand pieces to go with the initiative, including a vehicle wrap for the mobile recycling unit. This unit goes out to events and communities to collect recycling. It travels a lot, so we thought, why not make it into a rolling billboard? Look for the trailer at events around Jefferson county.
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MIX Branding MIX is a new restaurant in downtown Birmingham opened by well-known Chef, Chris Dupont. When Chris came to us, he had a big idea, but no name and no way to bring it all together. He had a vision to create a restaurant that was a bakery in the morning, a cafe at lunch, and a bar after work. But what do you call such a diverse concept that will make people understand. After a lot of thought, we landed on the name MIX. It has several meanings. First, there is the obvious mix of concepts that Chris has created. Second, he wants people from all different industries and backgrounds to mix and mingle in his new space. He wants the artists from downtown to mix with the lawyers and the bankers. And finally, to pay homage to the bakery portion of the restaurant, you use a mixer to create bread. We worked together with Mathieu Schmutzler of T.B.I.B. to create a logo and a tagline that captured the diverse offerings and the mixed atmosphere. |
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Seeking Interns The Modern Brand Co. is currently looking for a new intern for the fall semester. Because we are a small shop, our interns get to experience a little bit of everything. That could mean sitting in on brand strategy sessions in the morning and going to pick up groceries in the afternoon. Think you have what it takes to work with us? E-mail your resume to Michael Bell at michael@themodernbrand.com. |
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Landology Website
Landology is an investment firm focused exclusively on real estate opportunities. Their firm is comprised of experienced real estate developers, operators, investment bankers, and marketing experts with more than 75 years and more than $300 million in total real estate experience spanning all facets of the industry—commercial and residential. They selected The Modern Brand Co. to create their new online identity because of our unique process. Because we focus so intently on the user and the target audience, we build websites that work. Great design is always a goal, but we believe true usability and functionality must be considered. After a good deal of research into Landology's target audience, we discovered that they are extremely busy and make decisions very quickly. We knew we didn't have much time to hook them. So, we wrote the copy for the site in very small, "bite-sized" pieces. Each individual section of the site can be read in about 30 seconds. We worked with Richard Thomas of Red Iron New Media on the design and programming of this site.
Check out the full site and see if you can read it in 30 seconds. |
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Contact Us The Modern Brand Co. 1305 Second Avenue North, Suite 103 Birmingham, AL 35203 205-705-3777
Email Us. We love to hear from our adoring fans.
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PMP? Yeah you know me.
Do you know what PMP stands for? Its an official certification for Professional Project Managers earned through the Project Management Institute. And, Modern Brand Principal, Michael Bell earned his PMP certification this month. So, why would an advertising agency need to have a PMP on staff? Think about it, every project we complete for our clients has a budget, a timeline, and a multitude of deliverables. Whether we are designing a simple logo or building a fully integrated website with backend database features, we believe our clients deserve to have their projects managed in a professional manner. Too many advertising agencies use the excuse of creativity as a cushion against sound project management. At The Modern Brand, we believe that you can have both. We follow PMP approved guidelines for project management and that helps our projects get completed on time and within budget.
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