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When Annmarie and I launched our residential architecture studio in 1999, we made a very important decision about the name of our firm. We wanted to be sure that our name was unique and would clearly separate our studio from the many other residential architects in our region.

We wanted a name that would be easy to remember, endure and outlive the firm's founders when the next generation might take the lead.

We wanted a name that would not burden us as principals, forcing us to be the only people that prospects would want to meet when developing new business and interacting with clients. If our names were on the door, would we be the only people qualified to represent the firm?

We wanted a name on which we could build a brand.

We named our firm, Fivecat Studio and succeeded in building a successful brand of high-end residential architecture in the lower Hudson Valley of New York State.

This week on the Entrepreneur Architect Podcast, I am speaking with a person who understands the how important proper branding is to the success of every architect. She’s responsible for rebranding multiple New England-based architecture firms. Emily Hall is a Senior Associate with Union Studio Architecture & Community Design based in Providence, Rhode Island and we had a fantastic conversation about how to successfully rebrand an architecture firm.

Please review this podcast on iTunes.

Referenced in this Episode

Union Studio Architecture & Community Design
Donald Powers Architects
Rhode Island School of Design
Durkee Brown Viveiros Werenfels Architects
Society for Marketing Professional Services
University of Rhode Island
Congress of New Urbanism
Donald Powers, AIA, LEED AP, CNU
Douglas Kallfelz, AIA, LEED AP, CNU
Charrette Venture Group
StatCounter Analytics Software
Google Analytics
Robert Troutman, Highland Standard (graphic design)
Nail Communications
Cote Renard Architecture
Dig Architecture
Using a design brief
Definition of “Brand”
Importance of brand continuity
Operations manuals and brand guidelines (the brand book )
Chris McRobbie Design + Illustration (web design)

Contact Emily Hall
@UnionStudioArch on Twitter

Episode Transcription

(Transcript)

How to Successfully Rebrand An Architecture Studio with Emily Hall
Episode 65
Mark R LePage: This is the Entrepreneur Architect podcast episode 65.

(music)

Mark: Welcome back to Entrepreneur Architect podcast. My name is Mark R. LePage and this is the podcast dedicated to a successful life as a small firm architect. Whether you have plans to someday start your own firm, you're in the process to start up or you might be an experienced small firm architect just trying to make a difference, this podcast is for you. My goal is to inspire you to build a better business, so that you may pursue your purpose with passion and live the life of your dreams.

Mark: When Annmarie and I launched our residential architecture studio in 1999 we made a very important decision about the name of our firm. We wanted to be sure that our name was unique and would clearly separate our studio from the many other residential architects in the region. We wanted a name that would be easy to remember, would endure and will outlive the firm's founder when the next generation might take the lead. We wanted a name that would not burden us as principals, forcing us to be the only people prospects would want to meet when developing new business or interacting with our clients. If our names where on the door would we be the only people qualified to represent the firm? We wanted a name on which we could build a brand. We named our firm Fivecat Studio and we succeeded in building a successful brand of high end residential architecture in the lower Hudson Valley of New York State. This week on the Entrepreneur Architect podcast, I'm speaking with a person who understands how important proper branding is to the success of every architect. She is responsible for branding and rebranding multiple New England based architecture firms.

Emily Hall is a senior associate with Union Studio Architecture based Providence, Rhode Island and we had a fantastic conversation about how to successfully rebrand an architecture firm.

(music)

Support for everything we do here on entrepreneur architect is provided by our platform sponsor FreshBooks. The easiest ways to send invoices manages expenses and track your time for free 30 day trial visit freshbooks.com/architect.

(Convo starts)

Mark: Emily Hall welcome to the Entrepreneur Architect podcast.

Emily Hall: Thank you thanks for having me.

Mark: Thank you for taking the time to join me, I appreciate it.

Emily: (Uh huh)

Mark: You are a Senior Associate at a firm formerly known as Donald Powers Architects based in Providence, Rhode Island – my old stomping ground. I went Roger Williams University in Bristol, which is not too far from there. I'm heading back up there tomorrow to give us small talk to the A.I.A.S. up there So I'm excited to go back to, to where it all began. But in 2011, with your guidance, Donald Powers Architect successfully rebranded as Union Studio Architecture and Community Design and that's certainly, I'm sure we'll talk about it but it's no small feat to take an established firm with a principal's name on it and rebrand it successfully so it works and I'd love to discuss that. But before we get into that, I want to know a little bit more about you. I'd like to understand where you came from and where did you start, so if you could give us your origin story. What was your path to where you are today?

Emily: Sure! Well, like a lot of people who are in architecture marketing, I've never went out with this in mind as end career goal. I think a lot of people find themselves in the field of architectural marketing through a lot of different passing channels. Personally, I have an undergrad degree, an undergrad experience in art history in studio art that took me into New York City. After that, for five years working in the art gallery world and I went on talking a lot about art for five years. And I then I wanted to do some more design work, so I went back to school at Rhode Island School of Design where I got a master's degree in industrial design. And, then I got pulled into the architectural world because I wanted to do a simple job so I can have my own time – my time to do my own studio work in industrial designs so got a job for small architecture firm as a receptionist. And then (background noise) I'm sorry.

Mark: That's ok. (Laughing)

Emily: That's my rabbit actually causing some damage over there.

Mark: You might hear my dogs barking in the background.

Emily: (laughing) I apologize.

Mark: We roll really casually around here, so no worries.

Emily: Yeah. So then I was a receptionist in a small architecture firm and gradually just took on more and more responsibility and over the course of nine years at that firm which was Durkee Brown Viveiros Werenfels Architects also in Providence. I got a window into absolutely every job in the firm that was being not an actual architect. So, office management, doing the billing, accounts payable/receivables, then I got into the marketing from business side and then was able to educate myself in marketing through SMPS, The Society Marketing Professional Services – a great organization. Really taught me a lot about the new ones of marketing for architecture firms. Worked with them through rebrand, or at least a change of logo on website and then was asked to join Union Studio of Donald Powers Architects at the time. I've been there for 4 years and recently, last May I got my MBA from the University of Rhode Island which I was doing at night for the past 3 years.

Mark: Congratulations!

Emily: Thank you.

Mark: That's big deal.

Emily: Yeah. Well, you know, there's a lot of math involved and I didn't had much about my recent professional task but I'm glad I did it. I really I needed to round out my knowledge about marketing and business. It was kind of that final piece in the puzzle because I've been doing a lot of it over the years. I've always been somewhere between business and design and an operator within that margin, very left brain/right brain. So that's how I wind up where am I on today.

Mark: Yeah, it sounds like you are the every architect's dream. (Laughing)

Emily: (Laughing) Oh I don't know about that. I might be someone's nightmare.

Mark: (Laughing) No. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. Some would consider that but I think, from my point of view every architects needs to run their firm like a business and many of them either don't know how to or don't want to and to have somebody an onboard like you would be so great to be able to handle the business and the things and the let architects be architects.

Emily: Well, I've been fortunate to work with two firms that had a very strong business sense and I know it would be much more of a challenge to work with principals who didn't have that knowledge. So I've been very lucky that my opinion is being respected and considered and I'm lucky that there hasn't been much ego involved in the principal side on any firm that I worked with. So far, they've been very willing to change when they needed to change.

Mark: Yeah, I mean, Donald Powers Architects was a pretty established brand itself before they rebranded so, to have a firm that understood how to get to that point was unique in itself.

Emily: Absolutely! Donald did a great job from the very beginning at building a national client-base through thought leadership and membership in the Congress for New Urbanism which is an excellent organization which very much aligned with our mission and he was able to join that and earn a national client that way. Sometimes it's easier I think especially a small firm and a small state like Rhode Island to have that national credibility. To be an expert in a way, from a way essentially. He did a great job at building that. I commended him from knowing, and his partner Douglas Kallfelz, knowing that at that time, about the point that they reach ten years that is was time to make a change and that looking into the future of the business 10, 20 years later didn't need to be Donald Powers Architects anymore and that wasn’t in clear alignment with where the firm was going.

Mark: So let's talk about that. Talk a little about, first of all what does your firm do so everybody can the understands the type of firm, the size of the firm, that kind of thing and then talk about, you know, what was the trigger to change?

Emily: Sure! So, we are about 20 people which believe it or not is in a mid-sized firm in the state of Rhode Island. Our largest firm is about 30 people on a state. We do architecture and community design, so we're different as we look at architecture in the context of planning and master planning and, really the, 3D experiences in spaces so it's a combination of, that is a connective tissue that brings site together with the building and everything is in context or response to each other so it's a great mix of a pedestrian experiences is very friendly and walkable. So, we do a lot of housing, we do prototype housing and private residences, multi-family and affordable housing. We also do academic work, adaptive reuse, mostly full spectrum architecture.

Mark: And it's national. Everywhere. Pretty much you serve everywhere.

Emily: Yep! We're a boutique firm that works nationally. We've been lucky enough to have few projects in the Seattle area, we have one in California now, we had one in Texas, Virginia, New York State, Oklahoma We had a project in Oklahoma last year and oh, Canada! We had our first project in Canada last year. So, yeah we do work I guess you could say, internationally.

Mark: Yeah and are you growing?

Emily: Yes, we are. We just hired somebody and they started last week and we're looking to grow and that's part I think most rebrands that is the impetus, you know is an idea for around growth.

Mark: So, what was the trigger? What was the reason for the rebrand?

Emily: Well, 10 years old, looking into the future, I think Donald and his partner, Douglas knew that just having that one name on the sign didn't really reflect what we were about is a firm that was very much about collaboration, layering of efforts, community, the intersection of community and design. So, Union Studio and we're also located in Union Street, so that was an easy suggestion of a name but it also means so much more than that because it's really the intersection of so many things. And that's exactly how we view, with our broad holistic prospective on architecture and the built environment. That's how we view it. So, I think it was more of hitting that 10-year point and saying where are we gonna be? and how are we going to grow in 10 and 20 years? -and that really does reflect more about who we are as a culture and where the next generation of leadership's gonna come in. We didn't want to just add more names on.

Mark: Yeah. I think it's important when architects establish their firm from the beginning or if they're in that position now where they've started their firm and named it after themselves. To really consider that name, I think the name is so important. I don't think its ok to just open the firm and just name it after yourself because in the future it becomes an issue. Todd Redding, who is the COO of The Charette Venture Group, who introduced you and me, he and I have had a conversation about many of the architects that he's speaking with.. He's talking to many architects for what he is doing with the Charette Venture Group and so many architects are overwhelmed with the amount of work they're doing. Their own responsibility, the principals in their firm and so many of them are out, getting the work. And the reason they're out getting the work and not behind the drafting board designing is because their name is on the door and nobody wants to talk to anybody except for the guy with the name on the door and and so… the solution to that is to not put your name to the door. (Laughing)

Emily: Yeah, that's a good point. I hadn't really thought about it that way, in terms of business development, but it absolutely opens up your options and makes it easier for everybody in the firm to market on behalf of the firm.

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Mark: So what was the process that Donald Power Architects had to go through to get to where you are now?

Emily: Well, they had decided on the name by, you know about 90%, they had decided Union Studio as the name at the point that they had brought me in to help with the rebrand. So, I came in with that advantage that the name was chosen but we were really starting from scratch and we set our calendar and our time frame and knew that we wanted to launch within a year, which is actually a pretty aggressive schedule. Believe it or not, it sounds like a lot of time but there's a lot to be done. We started with a metric curve view and you know just based on the analytics about the existing site, they didn't have any analytics installed at that point. So we made sure to install the right tracking with the existing site to see where people are spending time and weren't so at least we got a, you know, base line of how much time of people spending on the site, what they were visiting or pages they were visiting.

Mark: What you are using to do...