Making waves with diplomacy

CONTEXT

Coare is the international leader in ocean diplomacy. Founded in 2006 by Christopher Chin, the organization authors and legislates environmental policy at the United Nations and with global governments and NGOs, focusing on plastic pollution, shark conservation, and marine protected areas. As co-facilitator representing a coalition of environmental NGOs, Coare has a seat at the table in critical global plastics treaty negotiations. Their audience is not the general public. It is policymakers, governmental bodies, international NGO networks, and the scuba diving industry.

CHALLENGE

Despite nearly two decades of legislative wins, UN participation, and an advisory board including Dr. Sylvia Earle, Coare was not well known, and their brand didn't reflect the credibility and weight of that work.

The core challenge was threefold: differentiating Coare in a crowded environmental sector, communicating the depth of their policy and diplomatic work to audiences with very different levels of fluency, and building a consistent brand system that could serve all three of those audiences without diluting focus or credibility.

PROJECT
REBRAND:
• BRAND STRATEGY
• BRAND IDENTITY SYSTEM
• MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS

MY ROLE
BRAND STRATEGY
BRAND IDENTITY DESIGN
CREATIVE DIRECTION & DESIGN
PROJECT LEAD

TEAM
- GEOFF SKIGEN:
BRAND STRATEGY AND
COPYWRITING
- CHRISTOPHER CHIN, FOUNDER
AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
- SARAH McQUILKIN, COMMUNICATIONS
DIRECTOR

Insight: In the environmental sector, most organizations look and sound alike. For an organization operating at the policy and diplomatic level, that sameness is a credibility problem. Standing out required going inward before going outward, excavating what Coare uniquely believes, how they work, and what they stand for at their core, and translating that into a brand voice and identity that no other organization could claim.

Insight: Organizations with a broad mission often resist defining a specific audience, believing their work is for everyone. But an unfocused brand speaks to no one. A key strategic move was clarifying that Coare's work reaches three distinct audiences with different needs, different entry points, and different relationships to ocean conservation, and building a brand platform that could serve all three without diluting Coare's positioning or credibility.

STRATEGY