It has been a rough first year for the new owners of Fort Street Cycle.
Bad energy left over from an unpopular ownership transition was sucking the life – and at one point, nearly every staff member – out of the shop. The new owners, from Beijing, were in crisis management from the get-go and wondering how they could survive. They decided they needed to start fresh. Well, fresher.
This is where the Brand Intervention happens. (This is the icon that says that’s happening.)
I started with some online surveys to existing customers and non-customers to determine attitudes towards the store, and its perceived strengths and weaknesses. This was the key starting point for the rebrand because it told us that there was indeed some bad juju out there about the store – but no respondents had a clear sense why they felt that way.
It also told us that the brand really wasn’t on anyone’s radar and was considered past its day.
So there was no damage here. But there was a lack of clarity about the store. The lack of clarity came from a lack of a vision, and a lack of noise in the market. But we could fix those.
ROLLING UP SLEEVES, FINDING A VISION
An analysis of the business, its core service and product offerings, and the opportunities in the market, indicated that we could chase the negative spirit away with a big, positive step forward. The store itself was in excellent shape: a good service reputation, a well-known location on Fort, and fantastic bikes: Cannondale, Cervelo and Giant, all high-end machines.
It just needed a focused brand strategy, and a look to pull it off.
The shop’s focus on placing service and proper fitting before bike sales pointed in the right direction, but we needed something bigger.
As luck would have it, the main competitive stores (Oak Bay Bicycles, Russ Hay’s, Trek and Broad Street Cycles) all referred to themselves as “bike shops” in their positioning lines. This created the opportunity.
IT’S ALL ABOUT THE RIDE
Fort Street Cycle would no longer be just a bike shop. It would be about cycling: where the rider and the bike come together to create the magic. The store would be all about that. Not a hardware store for machines, but a place for people who love to ride, something their focus on a better bike fit already beautifully supported.
Hence the new tagline: It’s All About The Ride
As the brand strategy and visual look were being created, the store went on a serious hiring spree. Using both online ads and networking, there were soon ten passionate cyclists on the store’s staff roster. A mix of road and mountain cyclists, elite competitors and everyday grinders, they embraced the new brand direction and shouldered the tasks involved in bringing it to life.
DON’T KILL THE OLD LOGO. JUST REMAKE IT.
Even though the store’s reputation had suffered in recent years, it was still an established brand with a history. We wanted to respect that by evolving the business, both the name and the logo. Enter long-time collaborator Michael Tension, who delivered a modern and impactful updating of the previous logo, along with an inspired palette of supporting colours to carry it. The name was shortened to Fort St Cycle, because it felt friendlier, and doing so created the space that allowed the name to be on one line in the logo, rather than stacked.
The store had been quiet in Victoria for years and was poorly connected to both the cycling community and the businesses along Fort St.
To help improve that, we gave the staff tools to build new relationships, from branded work gear to highly personalized business cards (the photo is of the staff member, and they chose their own quote and colour) – neither of which the store had ever provided. Then we crafted marketing and social media strategies to slowly build back their audience.
NEW BUSINESS CARDS
Once all the branded pieces were ready, Derek Ford did his usual exceptional job capturing the team spirit in photos. And then it was on to a welcoming Open House to let the market know Fort St Cycle was alive and kicking!
To promote the event and get rid of some pesky old branded water bottles, the staff rolled up invitations into the old bottles and left them in bikes with empty water bottle holders all over downtown.
The Open House saw a good crowd, and the positive buzz energized everyone and helped to exorcise the ghosts of the old brand.
A new website from Leap is on the way, jerseys are being printed and a store renovation is planned for late fall. The store also has plans to lead a cycling tour to the Great Wall in China this year. More details on that coming up soon! Until then, drop by the store and talk cycling: these guys know their stuff.
And ask for one of those cool new business cards!