HyNet North West is an innovative low carbon and hydrogen energy project that will unlock a low carbon economy for the North West and North Wales and put the region at the forefront of the UK’s drive to net zero.
As the project moves towards a more public-facing stage, we were tasked with evolving the HyNet North West brand and creating a series of assets to explain the project.
We developed the UI designs and redeveloped the HyNet webite, simplifying the navigation and streamlining information. We created a series of graphics and assets that could be utilised across multiple channels, as well as on the website.
Sitting alongside the website, we developed a consultation microsite to support the first consultation on the HyNet North West project. The look and feel reflected the overarching HyNet brand.
We develop social graphics to support HyNet’s key messages, encourage engagement and explain complex concepts to stakeholders and the public.
HyNet North West is made up of several different projects, the first of which is a carbon capture pipeline. We designed and delivered an animation to help explain key elements of the project in an accessible way, enabling people to easily respond to the project’s public consultation.
Powering up a ‘green’ design for RSK’s new electric vehicle fleet.
RSK Group approached our design team requesting a fresh and appropriately ‘green’ design for the livery of a new electric vehicle (EV) fleet. The aim was to develop a slightly modified version of the existing RSK design to make the new EVs stand out. This would help raise public awareness of RSK switching to EVs and reflect the company’s commitment to sustainability, caring for the planet and tackling climate change.
The main challenge was creating and adjusting a design that would suit various vehicles in the fleet, given the differences in vehicle size and shape. This involved manipulating and rearranging the various elements of the design to fit accordingly. As part of the process, our designer visited the company that applies livery designs to vehicles. Seeing the designs brought to life at full size was very different from the challenges of creating them on a small screen in the design studio.
Content and Creative has designed and delivered a range of marketing support material, including exhibition stands, digital publications and product information sheets, for a new client in the aquaculture industry. Innovasea provides end-to-end solutions for fish farming and aquatic species research, including equipment, consulting services and innovative platforms and products.
One of our tasks was to improve an existing e-book design and create a more sophisticated look and feel for a new digital publication. The e-book described the pros and cons of recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS), examined the costs of building and operating these facilities, and detailed the typical return on investment for two typical farms: one raising freshwater Atlantic salmon and the other raising saltwater red snapper. Promoting the e-book would enable Innovasea to showcase its expertise in this area and underline its credentials as a knowledgeable and trusted source of information.
The Content and Creative design team focused on creating a design that presented the content in a clear and simple way, and developed a set of thematic icons that represented each section in the book. One of the main challenges was finding accurate imagery for this fairly specialised subject area. Searches of commercial image libraries did not yield suitable images, so the job had to be put on hold while the right images were sourced. As the e-book would be available from the Innovasea website, our designers chose a simple landscape format for the layout that would be ideal for online viewing.
Providing clear, non-technical explanations of complex concepts is a crucial part of what we do. But just as important is ensuring that when we make the message more accessible, we do not compromise on technical accuracy. In this example, the client asked us to describe the challenge of rising energy demand for server cooling operations and to illustrate how a radical new solution could transform this requirement. A complex story that needed a light-touch visual style.
We sit between marketers, who need to make strong claims, and scientists and engineers, who tend to be cautious and rightly insist on technical integrity. There are also legal teams to keep happy.
All our writers have science or engineering degrees. This helps us to work with our creative colleagues to make a splash while respecting technical accuracy.
Catalyst company Albemarle, headquartered in Baton Rouge, USA, asked us to help write and redesign its customer magazine, Catalyst Courier. We helped to transform it from a dry-looking technical journal into a contemporary, colourful and engaging read.
Catalyst Courier is produced regularly in print and electronically. Our team writes some sections of each issue, manages the publication schedule, edits and proofreads the text, creates the layout and graphics, and liaising with the printers.
Moving from a ‘house of brands’ to ‘hybrid branding under a parent brand’
Acteon’s strategy was to move from a collection of individual brands operating under an umbrella name to a more formal hybrid-branding approach. The branded services, product lines and expertise were to be structured into eight strategic business segments that aligned with customer needs. These segments would combine the overall Acteon brand with the strongest existing brand in each segment. We helped define how these would be presented and described.
Times change and company activities change with them. Familiar product and service brands are re-named, retired, merged or moved to new homes. And the effects of these changes are felt most keenly at the client interface. Those who manage brands want to ensure that any new structure brings clarity and attracts new business, without alienating existing customers. This was exactly the challenge that we took on when we helped a major engineering group modify its service structure branding.
The Towns Fund is at the heart of the government’s ambition to levelling up places which have historically lacked investment and opportunity, enabling economic growth and regeneration. To support towns with securing and delivering the Town Deals, The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) appointed a delivery partner. It also represented a new way of working for government that of itself would help inform the shape of future funding delivery models and programmes.
The Towns Fund Delivery Partner is a consortium of six private sector organisations working as one with each fulfilling distinct strategic functions and bringing specialist expertise. Arup as consortium lead and with a multi-disciplinary role across the programme and service delivery, was supported by: Nichols Group leading on management and operations; Copper Consultancy as communications and engagement lead; FutureGov, learning and experience, governance and leadership lead; Grant Thornton, funding and investment, monitoring and evaluation, data insight lead; and Savills providing specialist place-based expertise.
Putting the town’s needs first was key. Based upon a town-centric and continuous learning approach to understand towns’ challenges, what they needed and when, the Towns Fund Delivery Partner was able to design and refine the support it offered as the programme progressed. It delivered advice and support at a range of levels that aimed to add value rather than duplicating resources already available to towns.
Working alongside the Towns Fund central team and Cities and Local Growth Unit Area Leads, the Towns Fund Delivery Partner was committed to the principle of co-design and co-working with Government. The Towns Fund Delivery Partner’s insights gleaned through its bottom-up approach, helped DLUHC develop its guidelines and requirements, identify the level and type of support provided to help towns that needed it most, and allowed for continuous improvement in delivery. A Total Towns Outcomes Framework questionnaire also gained understanding of towns’ longer-term priorities and desired outcomes.
We have been an integral member of the Towns Fund Delivery Partner’s strategic leadership group as lead advisor on its programme communications, working alongside the consortium team to deliver timely communication about the Towns Fund Delivery Partner’s services and support to towns. An ongoing commitment to understanding and anticipating both towns’ diverse needs and priorities, and in interpreting DLUHC’s requirements of towns in securing and delivering Town Deals, has been a necessity to manage a complex programme where towns are at different stages on the journey. We established and led the Communications and Messaging Working Group to facilitate a joint approach between the TFDP and DLUHC over the duration of Towns Fund Delivery Partner’s involvement in the Towns Fund.
Our expertise in effective community and stakeholder engagement, market positioning, brand development and use of social and other media has been drawn upon heavily by towns, firstly in developing their Town Investment Plans and then during early-stage Business Case development. This has been achieved through the creation of bespoke Towns Fund resources either as online guides, blogs and webinars or through one-to-one advice and coaching, Check and Challenge sessions and learning programmes such as Place Leadership and Making Connections Count.
Between May 2020 and November 2021, the Towns Fund Delivery Partner helped towns across four cohorts to develop a vision for their towns, produce Town Investment Plans to secure Town Deal offers and provided early-stage support to develop Business Cases for agreed projects. At its height, the Towns Fund Delivery Partner had over 260 team members representing 13 disciplines and 16 topic areas across the breadth of the country.
Worth more than £2.4 billion, all 101 towns that were selected for the programme received their Town Deal offers, paving the way for the delivery of nearly 800 projects across England.
RWE has ambitions to support the UK’s net zero goals and committed to investing £15bn in renewable generation in the UK. The business is rapidly changing, and we are tasked with helping the RWE team tell its evolving story.
To achieve its aspirations and contribute to positive change, RWE needed to transform its narrative and reach strategic audiences to reposition itself in the UK as a leading supporter of the UK’s journey to net zero.
Supporting investment and development aspirations required better relationships with statutory, political and community stakeholders. RWE’s new strategy and its impact on the UK was largely unknown, and educating those with influence was critical. Positively influencing at a national, regional and local level was also on RWE’s agenda to secure a greater share of voice.
Our approach was a sustained, multi-channel communications campaign to illustrate and reiterate the new brand and corporate strategy. Evaluation of the brand through the assessment of media and stakeholder sentiment gave us insight into share of voice, reputation and impact and, in partnership with RWE, developed a new corporate positioning strategy.
Already an integrated part of the RWE team, we developed a highly effective programme revolving around digital and social content laid the foundations for reaching critical audiences. Videos, animations, and graphics, delivered primarily via LinkedIn, visually bring RWE’s story to life. At the same time, we developed thought leadership pieces to begin to build RWE’s profile. Such assets supported our high-level media relations campaign and stakeholder engagement strategy designed to secure the attention of those most influential in the space.
The strategy achieved significant success for RWE, launching it onto the national stage, contributing to key conversations around renewables. We secured agenda-setting coverage in the Financial Times, Daily Telegraph and the Scotsman, and the BBC and Reuters. Significant exposure activity combined with a focus on high-level stakeholder engagement culminated in RWE holding a prominent role in the UK investment summit hosted by the Prime Minister. While further afield, we secured regional engagement with Welsh and Scottish devolved authorities and influencers.
Perceptions of the RWE brand shifted, it enjoys a greater share of voice and significant influence in relation to renewable generation in the UK. RWE is still on this journey and we continue to provide strategic and tactical support.
Cardiff Hendre Lakes is a proposed new business district at the heart of the Cardiff Capital Region. Served by Cardiff Parkway railway station, the development has the potential to support around 6,000 jobs and become a transport hub opening up access to employment opportunities across the region. Alongside leading communications, engagement and consultation for the project to support it through planning, we were asked to create a brand that captures a strong sense of place and bring the whole project to life.
The project’s goal is to become a catalyst for growth, contributing to the regeneration of East Cardiff and the wider Cardiff Capital Region by attracting high-quality businesses and investment. The development, which is located to the south of St Mellons Business Park, aims to deliver jobs and investment to the local area while helping people to connect with a unique landscape. All communications needed to be available in Welsh and English.
As the site is within a Site of Special Scientific Interest and part of the historically significant Gwent Levels, our aim was to build a relationship with the local community early, to explain the project’s potential benefits and incorporate local knowledge and feedback. This would lay strong foundations for the subsequent pre-application consultation. The design and branding of communications needed to be welcoming and reassuring, as well as flexible enough to work in a bilingual context.
We ran a series of branding discovery workshops to create a brand and logo in a colour palette of tonal blues and greens inspired by the natural landscape. To ensure accessibility and inclusion, we chose a simple sans serif font that would work well for Welsh and English printed materials such as a series of booklets, newsletters and feedback forms to support the consultation process. A multi-language website allowed people to access this information in a digital format. Exhibition banners, posters and signage all supported face-to-face consultation events.
The brand and materials have been well received by stakeholders and the community alike. Members of the public complimented the accessibility of materials during events surrounding the consultation.