Near the end of 2018 and into 2019, you might recall that we decided to shift away from this organization's previous name ("Welcome Home, Hickory Metro") towards something that spoke more to our intended audience...and yes, also happened to be catchier.
We decided on HKY4Vets (Hickory 4 Vets) because we felt it accomplished those very goals:
1. It clearly speaks to our intended audience - veterans (& military families)
2. Our social media accounts (Instagram, LinkedIN, Facebook, etc.) were already using the moniker.
3. It aligns itself well under the NC military brands of NC4ME and NC4Vets - we are in essence a "franchise" of their larger umbrella efforts.
4. Its full of acronyms and call letters like any good military lingo. I thought teachers used the most acronyms - sorry, the Armed Forces have them beat...by a country mile.
5. Though most won't immediately denote HKY relates geographically to the Greater Hickory Metro, Catawba County, etc. - maybe it will get there one day. Everyone in NC knows OBX stands for the Outer Banks...let's hope we can reach a status with HKY.
6. Not to mention that "4" could also harken back to days of the area being called the UniFour.
Along with the name change, and our whole shift in strategic focus (more to come on that), we knew we needed a new logo/brand guide to represent this fully recharged effort - and break away from the past. In steps Brad Metzgar from Metzgar Design in Hickory.
With very little direction but also very little boundaries, Brad was able to put together a whole host of initial options. Those were quickly whittled down to one possible option which we liked. From there, Brad really went to work - building out various looks of the logo (primary, secondary, color, black & white, grayscale, negative/positive), guidance on the use of certain fonts, and a whole new color palette. Truly awesome work and more than we ever expected to come our way in such a short amount of time...and again with minimal amount of direction.
Drumroll please.......
It's a different look for us definitely, but we really do like it.
We like that the underlying message of the "4" imagery - you can come from any direction (east, west, south or north), but we hope all those roads lead our way. Or you could also look at is as HKY4Vets stands as the junction point (the solid red circle tying it all together) of all of these different audiences - transition offices, Catawba County companies, veterans & spouses, veterans support organizations and more. We want to be a solid and dependable hub to all of these entities.
We hope you like it, and we hope you will be some of our "brand" ambassadors out there.
Should you want or need any of our new imagery, please feel free to send me (nhuret@catawbacountync.gov; Nathan Huret) a quick email, and I will be happy to supply.
Now to just ensure we've got this logo updated everywhere......
