Regional rebranding

Planners, business leaders hope to attract new businesses with marketing campaign

BY PAUL LEONARD of the VBJ

After months of study, consultation and review, a group of marketing and communications volunteers last week unveiled a campaign to lure more businesses to the region.

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Under the header, "Portland-Vancouver USA," the rebranding initiative featured a simple message for an intended audience of corporate relocation managers, CEOs and business owners: "Land Here, Live Here."

"We aren't going to be like Las Vegas and say we're going to rip jobs out of California," said Ron Arp of Vancouver marketing firm Amplify Group, which led the rebranding effort. "That's not us. We're a little bit more subdued."

In keeping with this low-key message, Arp pointed to the initiative's new logo, which integrates a stylized representation of two of the region's most identifiable geographic features - the Columbia River and Mt. Hood - using a muted color palate.

"We're like that Italian restaurant on the corner that nobody knows about," said Patrick Hildreth of Vancouver's Tribe2 Studios, the creator of the rebranding effort's logo.

Also of note during the June 9 presentation for a packed crowd in a conference room at the Hilton Vancouver was the inclusion of Portland in the new economic development initiative - from the name of the effort itself to images of the Willamette riverfront in the group's promotional materials.

Arp explained the Portland area's prominence in a mostly Clark County-led economic development effort by invoking the marketing campaign's target group of site selectors for businesses looking to relocate or build new facilities in the region. "They think in terms of statistical areas, not in terms of single municipalities," he said.

And in a perhaps rare moment of regional economic solidarity, representatives from Portland praised the initiative, albeit without promising their organizations would fully adopt the campaign's message and theme. "We are glad we are going to collaborate and blend our message with each other," said Susan Bladholm, senior marketing manager at the Port of Portland.

On the Vancouver side of the Columbia River, the new economic development initiative got a less equivocal thumbs-up. For example, a representative from the Port of Vancouver said the public authority would consider incorporating the "Portland-Vancouver USA" logo into its marketing materials.

"About 60 percent of businesses involved said they wanted to participate in this campaign and another 30 percent said they would play a limited role," said Ginger Metcalf, president of Identity Clark County - the group in charge of coordinating the effort.

For a $199 one-time licensing fee, payable to ICC, businesses may use "Portland-Vancouver USA" marketing materials to hand out at conferences and trade shows, as well as for use as a decal on the back of delivery vehicles, Metcalf said.

The marketing campaign also includes full-page color advertisements featuring two Clark County businesses, Thompson Metal Fabricators and Agave Jean Co., as a way to create what Arp called a "vehicle to tell the region's story."

That "vehicle" will soon take its first major test drive. According to CREDC president Bart Phillips, the organization plans to roll out the marketing campaign at a regional conference in San Francisco in late July.

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