Matchstic Rebrand – Fresh Fire
First, forgive my cliche fire innuendos, but I'm excited.
It has been quite a year. A new office, new team members, and finally — some new materials. We've had a new brand identity in the works for sometime now (reminded of the old saying “The cobblers kids don't have any shoes”). It started in fact last January when we decided to leave the Matchstic house behind and relocate to the Jane. We wanted to set the right perceptions for our own brand and felt the house just was not up to par with who we'd become. With a new office came a new matchstic once that again wasn't properly represented in our logo type. We needed a change.
Like all rebrands, we have two choices, evolutionary or revolutionary, when considering a change. We love our flame and wouldn't lose it for the world, but other outdated and uninspired elements were up for grabs.
We started with an update to the Matchstic wordmark. Running on over five years of use, the old type and banner was beginning to show its age. Not to mention the old banner had the by-line “Branding + Design”, a moniker found nowhere else since switching to “A Brand Identity House” in 2008.
For inspiration on a typeface we looked at our giant, metal found letters that hang by the front door. “Matchstic” is spelled out from a group of mismatched fonts, with a letter “t” that stood out with interesting character details. We used these characteristics to customize a new wordmark, simple with a subtle hint of personality, but better yet with a significant story to tell. Another slight tweak was evolving from a lowercase character setting to a title case. Even though our sign is all lower case we felt the new word mark held a stronger presence with a capital “M”.
After the word mark was complete and paired with our flame we moved into new collateral on a “doing retreat” back in October. We simply created, experimented, and had fun for a day. We came away with an idea of creating a system of standardized tools (like stamps) that ensure a consistent look and feel, but could be applied in infinitely unique and flexible ways. The result of that idea is 30+ custom Matchstic stamps that can be applied in various ways on business cards, note cards, packaging, and any other printed material (including body art). Included in the set is every team members personal stamp with their contact information to applied to our business card shell. This allowed us to letterpress two versions of really high-end cards for a fraction of the normal cost. The only catch is having to hand stamp all of your business cards (or have intern Patty do it). This stamp system allows us to have fun with our collateral. It allows us to make every piece unique. I no longer just send another thank you note, but I create one.
A few process images from our “doing retreat”:
Brainstorming Board
T-Shirt Comps
Some final products:
Blind Deboss – 2-ply 80# French Pop Tone glued to 279# Crane Pearl Kid Finish
Back Variations – "Start Fires" & "We ignite passionate brands"
Stamp Test Pad
Full Stamp Collection
Applied Stamp Set
Thank You Notes w/ "ch" blind deboss
Msc. Body Stamping
Gift Packaging & Set
Big thanks to Crayton-Heritage Letterpress in Charlotte for all their help.
27 Comments
"Absolutely beautiful. I can't think of anything better to represent the company and culture of Matchstic."
- Scott Fuller
"I love the tweak on the T in your house font. The Ts on your wall are obviously from an old Firestone sign and the subtle reference to another "fire" based brand is smart and works to cement the point that brands are so powerful even a single letter can carry a brand. Really stellar work guys."
- Matt Bunk
"Floored."
- Gavin Baker
"Quite well done gents, quite well done."
- Joseph Szala
"rare sighting of casuAlvin wearing a white tee!"
- Alana
"Beautiful concepts and exceptional design!"
- jackie newman
"Nice work. Love the stamps as a way to customize and save costs. Letterpress gets pricey quickly."
- Adam Harrell
"Yo, Blake! Send one of those shirts my way!!! (Adult L) :)"
- Intern Nick
"omg. neue t's, biz cards, AND STAMPS? Y'all are on fire. These look great!"
- Simon
"T-shirt comps / Row three / All the way to the right / Nice mug! Great refresh too."
- Dan Romanoski
"Love everything about this! Very well done. It's great being a Matchstic Client!"
- Brett T.
"Thanks everyone! @InternNick once we print some you're all over it!"
- Blake Howard
"Solid.
One question: I always wonder about the stamp solution because of it's unclean registration. I feel like this aesthetic works perfectly for the redesign you guys did for A Bryan Photo (analog, southern, a little rough), but seems messy for a business card application for a branding house (but plausible for other applications). Is that just me? I'd love to get your take on why you did it for the business cards other than "just to save $$.""
- Nate
"Love the stamp collection so much!"
- brian dolleman
"Hey Nate. Great Question.
Stamps are extremely flexible for a growing and changing workplace. They allows the potential for new team members to have cards with the small task of creating a new stamp. We chose to letterpress our cards and the texture and personality provided by the stamps felt comparable. The Matchstic team members all wear different hats and this was the perfect balance between all the working parts of our team.
btw, you can change your ink color too! :)"
- Staci J.
"@Nate - Staci explained it well. Curious why you think a branding firm can't look messy? Does that mean all firms' collateral should feel "clean"?
Ps- You are correct stamps are messy!"
- Blake
"[...] I’m consistently impressed with the work coming out of Atlanta-based Matchstic, so my eyes widened when I spotted the recent rebrand of their own studio. As designers, we all know how difficult it can be to create work for ourselves — I’ve been toiling away at our own rebrand for months and months — so it’s really interesting and inspiring to see what they accomplished. To get more insight into what went into the work, and to see a few more visual details, check out the original blog post right here. [...]"
- design work life » Matchstic Rebrands
"Man, this is so ill! Congrats on the success, guys!"
- Ryan Harrison
"Hey Staci and Blake, thanks for the answers.
Blake, maybe this is hypocritical, but if I received a business card, and it was stamped, even with the beautiful and luxurious letterpress stock, I would think it was cheap. But maybe you should send me a card so I can look at it in person and feel it! haha
And I wouldn't say all firms' collateral should feel "clean" but the business card seems like it should be. (e.g. I love the handwritten and stamped notecards...). But a stamped business card reminds me of a car-salesman who has a little blank underlined mark on a generic card who writes in his name... I guess that's what I sense."
- Nate Henderson
"Incredible. Love the new look!"
- Jonathan Hartley
"Guys...incredible work, love seeing that red and black. All the stamps together on one sheet looks like it would look great on the back side or inside of stationary."
- John
"Holy mama. What an awesome job! If you actually print the Hotlanta shirt, I will pay top dollar for an American Apparel large. :)"
- Cory McCollum
"It always so hard to create your own identity and I think this is just great and so personal! Just love it."
- Chris Linden
"[...] line of thinking reminds me of our awesome (I'm bias) new print collateral with a flexible system of stamps intended to be used in a variety of ways when [...]"
- Rules & Regulations | Branding Blog | Thoughts From A Brand Identity House | Matchstic
"nice work, awesome to see the process.
Love all the stamp variations;
my favorite icon is probably the 'on the house' with the flame being served
good design!"
- m
"[...] Matchstic Rebrand – Fresh Fire | Branding Blog | Thoughts From A Brand Identity House | Matchstic. [...]"
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"[...] Brand identity update from Matchstic, an Atlanta based premier brand identity house. www.matchstic.com [...]"
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