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City branding revisited with two new options

Two new branding tag lines are up for consideration and Williams Lake’s economic development manager encourages people to weigh in.

Two new branding tag lines are up for consideration and Williams Lake’s economic development manager Alan Madrigga encourages people to weigh in.

The choices —  “Life is Bigger Here” or “Western, Rebooted”  — were posted on the city’s branding site last Wednesday, Oct. 23.

“The Life is Bigger tagline was actually developed last fall,” Madrigga said. “It went to the advisory committee, it didn’t come to the top of the heap, but it got some good comments.”

“Western, Rebooted,” was developed after brainstorming words people used most commonly, he explained.

“The word western was easy, but the fact that there’s so much more to do, so reboot,” Madrigga said. “It’s been interesting because people have had different reactions.”

Some people think it’s about a boot, some people think it’s about technology, he said, adding the challenge is coming up with a tagline or logo that appeals to everyone.

After the originally suggested tagline “Republic of Life” received heavy opposition from many community members earlier this year, Taijii Brand Group and the city’s branding advisory group went back to the drawing board and asked for more community input through a survey.

Madrigga said during May and June around 200 people responded to the survey, some filling it out on paper, but the majority of them were filled out online.

Respondents identified the things they liked about living in Williams Lake included the great outdoor access, affordability and the chance to be independent.

“There were people for and against the whole Western culture thing, so we tried to look at something that was going to balance all of that,” Madrigga chuckled, adding it wasn’t an easy task.

The public will have about two weeks to weigh in on the two new taglines and then staff will summarize the feedback for city council.

“We may recommend using either or we may decide to eventually use both of them,” Madrigga said.

“It will depend on the type of audience we’re targeting or ad we’re designing.”



Monica Lamb-Yorski

About the Author: Monica Lamb-Yorski

A B.C. gal, I was born in Alert Bay, raised in Nelson, graduated from the University of Winnipeg, and wrote my first-ever article for the Prince Rupert Daily News.
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