Arlington Heights looks to 'refresh' logo, marketing; will a horse still be featured?

Arlington Heights won't do a full-scale rebranding in concert with its ongoing Discover Arlington marketing campaign, but officials still plan to do a less-costly "refreshing" aimed at creating a consistent logo and tagline.

Village officials have debated making changes to their marketing efforts since at least 2012, though a wider-scale branding overhaul was rejected by village board members two years ago as too costly - $200,000 by some estimates.

But they still expressed a desire for an image "cleanup."

To that end, trustees agreed to spend $35,000 this week on a consultant who will create three to five new logo and tagline concepts and determine if there's an opportunity to unify existing logos used by village government.

There's currently seven different logos in use across village departments - from an image of the village hall clock tower on the Discover Arlington marketing logo, to a horse's head in the shape of the letter A on the official village seal and affixed to public works vehicles.

The latter is a nod to Arlington International Racecourse. But with the racetrack's future in limbo, it's unclear if the horse will remain part of the logo and other branding efforts.

The board hired Springboard Brand & Creative Strategy, based in downtown Arlington Heights, to come up with logos, taglines, and a series of print and digital ads that promotes the village as a destination. The firm's work also is expected to include an evaluation and recommendations about the Discover Arlington logo and tagline "Always More to Discover!" in addition to the other logos that aren't used for marketing.

"We have seven different logos that have proliferated throughout the village over time, so that is part of the scope: looking at bringing that back into scale and what can we do with that village logo (and) how can we get one more-cohesive message in our logo development," said Charles Witherington-Perkins, the village's director of planning and community development.

Springboard, founded in 2002 by Rob Rosenberg, specializes in creating brand identities and advertising programs in the health care industry, with Northwest Community Healthcare, Friendship Village of Schaumburg and the American Academy of Pediatrics among a list of clients.

But the marketing firm also has done work for Rosemont, Aurora, and West Lafayette, Indiana, and was the preferred choice of an Arlington Heights staff committee that evaluated submissions from seven vendors who responded to a request for proposals last year.