Mississippi Main Street Freshens up their Image

The Mississippi Main Street program is one of the best coordinating programs in the country, and I have had several opportunities to work with their communities to help them develop community branding campaigns. When I realized that I would have a little time at home after the baby came, I asked Bob Wilson if I could take a stab at freshening up the identity system for the program. The previous logo was well implemented, and appeared on the signs which announced arrival to all the Main Street Communities, but it did not create a system that made it easier to teach the four point approach, nor position the organization as a creative, and progressive economic development entity. The Association's recent move into a new office building marked to perfect time to freshen things up, as their printed materials were going to have to be updated anyway.So we created this progressive new logo, made up of a defined color palette, contemporary san serif font, and icon, comprised of four images, representing the Main Street Four Point Approach®. We also introduced a new program tagline: four points for progress. We felt like these fours words summed up the efforts of this statewide support network network. We created different versions of the logo, depending on where they would be used, for example, on a national level, Mississippi is larger, helping to make it stick out from other state coordinating programs. On the local level, we even created a simple version of the four blocks and MMSA, allowing local communities to roll the identity into their own marketing materials. One of the best parts about this system is its ability to promote the tenets of Main Street Revitalization approach with the four committee structure. We even created sub logos to help MMSA when training program managers and volunteers on those four points. Over the coming months, you will see this logo system begin to be incorporated in their website, stationary, and program materials, and we look forward to seeing the benefits that it has for the organization. For more information about the Mississippi Main Street program, go to http://www.msmainstreet.com