Client: Bowling Green Area Chamber of Commerce | Agency: Yonts + Co
My work with the Bowling Green Area Chamber Commerce, or BG Chamber, began soon after I started at Yonts + Co. I served in multiple roles for various projects from 2018 to 2021.
In 2018, my first project for Yonts + Co was giving the BG Chamber a new logo for the first time in 20 years. With my boss facilitating meetings and schedules, I was able to focus entirely on creative direction and design of the brand.
Early meetings with the team at the Chamber brought up a couple of keywords and ideas: Modern. Unique. Clean. Professional. Something that was new and forward-thinking, but not too playful.
For a little context, the town of Bowling Green, Kentucky, is often referred to as just ‘BG’ in our area of Kentucky. It’s why you’ll see plenty of businesses and government entities tie the letters into their brand. That’s when I noticed all of those iterations used these cases of initials: ‘Bg’ | ‘BG’ | ‘bg’. Nobody had tried to use ‘bG.’
Design ‘rules’ might say not to do this, but we thought it was a perfect representation of what the Chamber does for the community: Push forward the growth of our region by inviting new ideas and businesses to the area. Luckily, the Chamber agreed and went for the different look.
In 2019, the BG Chamber was selected as one of three finalists for the American Chamber of Commerce Executive’s Chamber of the Year award. As the multi-step application process required a large binder of requirements, they requested our help to utilize their new brand to make the design stand out.
As with the rebrand, my boss handled meetings and timelines, while I was able to design the layout as I saw fit, within the given requirements of the application process. Having just executed their new branding, I was excited to flesh out the design beyond the logo and style guide.
After working with us twice before, the Chamber came directly to Yonts + Co to design their 2019 annual magazine. This time, I stepped into the lead role for the project. Beyond just designing the magazine’s layout, I was also responsible for coordinating content delivery (articles, ads, and photography) from the Chamber and its partners, creating a theme for the publication, and gathering extra content as needed.
The Yonts + Co team landed on the theme of ‘Rooted.’ Our focus was what brought BG to this level of growth. After the Chamber launched their new brand and nearly won Chamber of the Year, we wanted to pay homage to the community that helped them achieve that success.
To execute this idea in print, I wanted to contrast the modern design of the magazine’s interior with vintage photography for the exterior and section covers. We used verbiage like ‘roots,’ ‘planting,’ and ‘cultivate’ to emphasize the comparison. From front to back, we crafted every piece of content to reflect our theme—including our main article Rooted in Speed, a look at the growth of the Corvette (made exclusively in Bowling Green, Kentucky).
With 2019’s magazine focusing on the roots of the Chamber’s relationship with Bowling Green, it was a natural progress for 2020’s version to feature what’s next. Settling on the theme of ‘Built for Growth,’ we wanted to show the community that the Chamber had big plans for BG.
From the jump, I knew my layout was going to be toned down from a photography standpoint but use a lot more design elements. I allotted more time to flesh out the designs of the infographics to truly show the growth of BG through statistics. Using modern design, we incorporated a broader color palette to reflect an openness to new ideas. With the magazine finishing not long before COVID-19 struck, we felt that the message was made even more relevant. Our community had come a long way, and we would continue to grow through any adversity.
