DK Holland

Why does our fledgling food co-op in Brooklyn need a brand? We don’t even have a space yet. And there are a few other problems: we have zero dollars in our coffers and we need 100% participation of members in all our decisions, especially the approval of the brand ID. And since we don’t have money, we don’t really have members. Which comes first: the chicken or the co-op logo?

Let me back track. I was one of the people starting this new working co-op in Brooklyn in January 08 and, of course, coming from the branding profession I was very concerned that we have a very inspired identity. And I said to my fellow organizers, ‘Once we get our brand, we will seem more real.’ And then I literally prayed for really good branding designers to materialize. Two months later, into a co-op meeting walks Geoff Cook, a new neighbor and partner in Base Design. Like an angel hearing my pleas, he offers everything we need to brand our coop. And I know Base Design – have writtten about the hiatus MoMA took to Queens and how Base was involved in that very successful branding project.

Imaginary storefront for Greene Hill Food Coop

grocery signs for Greene Hill Food Coop

A reminder that members run Greene Hill Food Coop

This solution looks so easy, so natural, so right. But the process was mighty methodical to get there. To start we needed a name. And one member pointed out it should not suggest members must be from our area, Fort Greene / Clinton Hill: that was limiting. We agreed. So the members suggested options and we voted. We almost unanimously voted for The Greene Hill Food Co-op with the caveat that ‘The’ needn’t be used in the branding.

Then I suggested we ask ‘members’ (eg anyone interested in the co-op is a member) a lot of questions and feed back to them their responses. This we did over the summer with Base’s totally involvement. Then I suggested we show preliminary ideas that represented a range of thinking knowing that none of them might be just right. Base (led by designers Anna Simutis and Yoon Yoo) applied their analytical intelligence, ingenuity and high level design skills and came up with three distinctly different approaches to act as a springboard for comments. And they created a feed back sheet which was passed out at the meeting and collected at the end. Meaning, the members were 1) reminded they had already guided us in a certain direction and that 2) we were now asking them to guide us further and 3) that we would be back with a refinement based on their ideas. The tree directions were presented and the members verbalized their very insightful and intelligent response to all three ideas, bringing up ideas that none of us had thought of.

The last meeting showed the above. We called for a vote and it was unanimous. Members said, ‘It’s like you heard what we had to say and came up with the perfect solution’. And here’s the answer to the first question: why does the co-op need a brand now. As one member said at the end of the meeting. “We don’t even need a space. We look like we are real now that we have a brand!”

The new brand is getting a fair amount of press. Identity Works posted the following recently:

http://www.identityworks.com/probono/Greene%20Hill.htm