Planning & Economic Development Committee

PLANNING AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE DECEMBER 14, 2010 A meeting of the Planning and Economic Development Committee was held on Tuesday, December 14, 2010 at 6:46 p.m. in the Aldermanic Chamber. Chairman Michael J. Tabacsko presided. Members of Committee present: Alderman Richard J. LaRose, Vice Chair Alderman-at-Large Barbara Pressly Alderman-at-Large Mark S. Cookson Alderman Arthur T. Craffey, Jr. (arrived after roll call was taken) Members Not in Attendance: Also in Attendance: Alderman-at-Large Brian S. McCarthy Thomas Galligani, Economic Development Director Christopher Williams, President, Greater Nashua C.O.C. Chairman Tabacsko Tonight on our agenda we have the one item; it is a presentation by the Economic Development Office and Chamber of Commerce, Tom and Chris. I think everybody knows you so I think we can dispense with the formalities, and ask you to tell us about branding and marking. DISCUSSION Branding/Marketing Initiative Thomas Galligani Thank you for the invitation and it is something that I know Chris and I are pretty excited about, an I know when I have come before this board for annual discussions about what is happening in economic development this is something that perks a lot of interest, a lot of folks on this board seem pretty interested. In particular, Alderman Tabacsko and Alderman Cookson and also Alderman Clemons who isn’t here right now, all have approached either the Mayor, myself, or Chris as showing some real interest in wanting to see something happening with regards to city branding. I am very pleased to bring to you a presentation that both Chris and I something that we have been discussing and working on over the last year or so to look at an opportunity to get together, the Chamber of Commerce (Chamber) and the City, to develop a plan for marketing and branding Nashua. Timing is pretty important. From our perspective it seems like a great opportunity to take a look at projecting a strong image of Nashua and when you think about what Nashua has done in the past for marketing efforts, it has been a long, long time since we had anything with some real traction. The Money Magazine a notoriety that the City received ten years ago and twenty years ago were huge opportunities in projecting a strong image for Nashua, not something that we did actively, but the recognition certainly was pretty valuable. It has been a long time, probably a decade, since we got a real punch out of developing an image for Nashua. We also recognize that because of the development of Nashua over the years it is not clear what Nashua is to many people. As a newcomer to Nashua growing up on the Massachusetts side I always thought of Nashua as a place to go and shop and to other people Nashua means different things, and it is a good opportunity to take a look and really put together a strong coherent image for Nashua. Given that the economy is struggling it seems like an opportune time to really push Nashua as a place to attract businesses and attract visitors and new residents. We fell like it is a great opportunity. PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 2 Here is a copy of the cover from July of 1997, so we are talking over 13 years ago, where the community for the second time and the only community in the history of Money’s survey to be named the Best Place to Live twice. The value of having a cover on a magazine especially when magazines were in much wider distribution it was a pretty compelling media buy. If we were to purchase this ad, front page on a major national magazine, it clearly would have been millions and millions of dollars and we benefited strongly from that big push then. Christopher Williams Thanks Tom. Tom and I are going to kind of tag team here a little bit in terms of some of these slides here. I will formally introduce myself for the viewers who may be watching this later. My name is Chris Williams, I serve as the President of the Greater Nashua Chamber of Commerce, and I am happy to partner with Tom not just on this presentation tonight but hopefully on the project as it moves forward. This is something that we have been talking about for a while and I have been able to have conversations with Alderman Cookson and Alderman McCarthy and Alderman Clemons in the past, and we think we have an opportunity to actually move forward on something here. As Tom already kind of set the stage for you, we do have an opportunity on the city side. We also have an opportunity to re-brand the Chamber itself. Now the Chamber has not been updated in terms of its brand and its identity for over 20 years. We think that given where marketing is heading especially with regards to social media and the kind of shrinking of our national economy relative to the global economy, this is an opportunity for two entities in a relatively small city to come together, perhaps share some resources, and make sure that we have a consistent branding image that is out there. I wanted to just touch on that for a second here as this slide shows here right now; we have several different entities the city being one, the Chamber being another, Great American Downtown being another example of entities that are all in their own way promoting the greater Nashua region or the City of Nashua specifically, and we are all doing a good job of it, but we are not consistent with each other. We are using different messages, different collateral that we will show a few examples of here in just a second, but we are all doing different things. We are not that large of a city that we shouldn’t be able to coordinate this better and make it so that it is consistent so that no matter who is looking at the City of Nashua they are receiving the same message; they are receiving the same talking points, the same assets that we are all promoting. Right now if you look at the Chamber what it is doing, the Great American Downtown, the City all of the efforts to some form or fashion aren’t funded as well as they could be, they are not really penetrating the market as far as they could be, and again they are just not really in a collaborative cohesive message that we think we could be supporting. Tom will go to the next slide and there you will see this here is a City piece of collateral that is put out, and again it is a very well done piece. It promotes Nashua. If you open that brochure you see some very good things about Nashua. If you got to the next slide though you will see a couple of pieces of collateral; one that is put out by the Chamber and one that is put our by the Great American Downtown. Again, each piece is professionally done and it is done well by marketing agencies by marketing experts and they are produced on very nice material yet they are not consistent with each other. They are not saying the same thing they are not showing the same brand. Here we have, those are just three examples of what we could be doing together in providing that united front. The opportunity again as we stated, Tom talked about the City not really having for a while anyway done a branding effort. The Chamber certainly hasn’t done it, I can speak to that, and we are, over the last year, we have been talking with my board of directors about updating the Chamber’s brand, its identity, giving us a new website and new marketing collateral, and Tom has said you know what we might be interested in doing something on the city lines could we work together on one project that does serve as an umbrella for any re- branding initiative that would involve both the Chamber and the City together. We have talked to Tom’s department, Tom has in turn talked to the Mayor, and the Mayor is interested enough, I won’t speak for her, I will probably let him speak to that, but we think that her office is interested enough that there could be some seed money made available to a larger campaign that seed money being used to leverage private sector dollars that would then come in and really help to provide the lion’s share of the funding that would go into this campaign. We will touch on what that cost would be here in just a few slides. PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 3 What we do see though is an opportunity for Tom’s office and the Chamber to partner together to identify where the funding would come from and what this whole project would look like. Tom Galligani Chris and I worked fairly closely together on different projects and so it is not unusual for us to talk and to think about things, but we haven’t really had an opportunity to work with a real juicy project that really leverages both the City’s and the Chamber’s strengths so we are pretty excited about this opportunity. When we think about what we are trying to do by branding the city and what does it mean and what are we trying to accomplish from our perspective, again we talked about a consistent, strong, cohesive brand for Nashua, but what we are trying to do is attract new business to Nashua, project an image so that people will want to come here, businesses will want to locate here, attract more visitors and customers to Nashua, which as a retail hub it is something that consistently happens, we would love to see more visitors, more tourism type visits to Nashua. They could be in downtown and some of our other cultural amenities. We’re also hoping that this will project an image that helps us to retain that young and that workforce, which has been the topic of much concern across the State of New Hampshire. Actually it has been a concern almost everywhere in the country except for maybe Colorado or Southern California. Every place wants to make sure they keep the young folks so that we have a real strong base on which to grow businesses and grow workforce. There is an opportunity to establish a brand that is consistent among all of the stakeholders as Chris described; the City, the Chamber, the Great American Downtown (GAD), but there are also other folks that would benefit from a strong general Nashua brand and that is our colleges, our five colleges, many of the private corporations that are trying to attract people to live and work here in Nashua, and also the real estate community certainly. What we think makes a lot of sense is to go forward and try to establish sort of an umbrella brand, a big picture brand for Nashua but that it allows for specific constituencies to carve a nitch within this umbrella brand so it is consistent with what we are all talking about, but still provides them the opportunity to identify themselves and be unique. Some of the big picture elements in any kind of branding campaign, but certainly on a community brand campaign, some basic market research, developing what that brand identity is going to be, and also a plan; what are we trying to target specifically, how do we get there and achieve those goals that we just spoke about. Christopher Williams Those three major elements that Tom just touched upon; market research, brand identify, and then the actual action plan itself, we see those as being kind of the three major activities that would be undertaken by this initiative starting with the market research itself. We intend to go out and spend some time in the community itself, within the business community, within the City through the public sector, through some of the non-profit organizations here for the community, and really figure out what are those assets here within Nashua that we think best utilize our efforts in terms of recruiting and retaining businesses and workforce here to the City of Nashua. So we would plan on having focus groups though within those different components of the community doing some of that research here to figure out from a business side what this is going to mean for Nashua and then of course take a look at some of our competition here in the area as well; what is happening in Lowell, up in Manchester, over in Worcester, what about Portsmouth and kind of look at the immediate northern New England region and some of the cities that are roughly our size and figure out what are they are doing vis-à-vis what are we doing in terms of their assets versus ours. Tom Galligani The second step is to develop that brand identity and what is Nashua and again it means that Nashua is a lot of different things, it is a great place to live, it is a place that is a shopping destination, it is a place where high- PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 4 tech and manufacturing still happen and still thrive today, a lot of different things so how do we capture all of those elements of Nashua into a concise vision. We want to understand who we are competing for, who we are trying to attract specifically, where those opportunities are; where they are located geographically, who we are competing with in terms of cities and regions for companies and for the young workforce, and we want to make sure we completely understand how our messaging and our branding is distinct and unique enough so that it has some traction. Sort of the last step is developing that action plan and that package of goodies that becomes the tactics and implementation strategies for getting the word out about this brand. To a lot of people it means a logo and a tagline. You have probably seen a lot of great examples of that, not just for communities but for any kind of product that you might see, and certainly that is a piece of what we are trying to accomplish, develop a logo and a tagline, but it is more than that it is about developing those talking points that consistent messaging that everybody in the community could tap into whether it is the City, the Chamber, again the colleges, the real estate community, so everybody is speaking the same language as we project an image to the outside world. And then different brand building ideas not just the logo and a tagline, but it might mean developing also events that would be consistent with the brand that we have identified; if we are a high-tech destination perhaps we do business plan competitions or a business incubator, something that really makes the messaging and the branding that we are talking about more authentic. Christopher Williams Those three pieces the research that would go into it, the actual building of the brand identity, and then putting the action plan together will all come together and hopefully produce some of these items that we see on the screen here in front of you. We hope that at the end of the day there will be a collaborative community brand that all of us are using. I did want to make a special point to say that we are not looking to have one brand that is now going to be the Chamber brand and the City brand and the Great American Downtown brand; we will all still each have our own unique identities so that when you go to the Chamber website you will know that you are going to the Chamber’s website not the City’s website and visa versa, same with the Great American Downtown. But what you will find on all of the different websites for these different organizations is a common theme that unites the three of them together. We will show a couple of examples of that here in just a few slides. But I did want to make sure everyone is on the same page with me in the sense that we are not looking to have one brand that suddenly is going to replace everything else. We will still be known as the Gate City and that is an important distinction for us historically and that is not one that we are looking to replace by any means. This really is more about the business side of Nashua itself. So under point #2 there you will see the umbrella under which you will still have a logo and tagline that can be leveraged by other stakeholders but we will still have our own unique identifies. Some of the things that Tom already referenced that we are hoping to get out of this are web pages that will have similar themes. We hope to actually start taking advantage of social media that is out there. I get Alderman Cookson’s tweets all the time. It would be great to actually have some City and Chamber tweets going out or Facebook identities, and really starting to leverage the social media that is out there as well. And then, of course, as Tom said there could be the opportunity for special events that are born out of this to augment that new umbrella brand and other ideas. We don’t know what those will be yet. We are at the very beginning of this whole initiative, but we are excited by the potential for it. PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 5 Tom Galligani What is this going to cost? Well based on a lot of discussions that Chris and I have had and some research that we have undertaken; we talked to the experts in the field, marketers, we talked to them, how much would this cost to develop what we are describing. We also talked with other communities of similar size to see what they are doing, how much they spent, what kind of results they got out of that. What we came up with is basically we are looking at about $80,000 to $100,000 to develop this whole package and this whole approach and to begin some of those initial steps for implementing the brand. How are we going to do this? Well we have a couple of different thoughts. Christopher Williams As I said earlier, Tom and I sat down with the Mayor to present the concept of this whole initiative and she was excited enough by it to say that the City could indeed put in seed money for this initiative. The idea is that the City will put in that seed money, we will then turn around to the private sector and say the City think that this is important enough that they are willing to make this commitment will you now join in with us as a private sector to really fund the rest of this. At the end of the day you are looking at roughly 2/3 of the costs born by the private sector and 1/3 born by the City once the fundraising all comes together. As you see up there the Chamber of Commerce is willing to lead that fundraising effort and to go out and talk to these companies and really kind of drive the bus on that. We don’t think it is right and I don’t think you as City officials would feel comfortable either with the City going out and doing that fundraising effort, and it is appropriate for a chamber to take on that sort of a role. That is something you could count on the Chamber for really taking the leadership role on in terms of raising the money that would go into this project. Another note on some of those possibilities where we do think that the donations could be raised from; obviously first and foremost the business community itself, also there are certain entities within the City that really benefit from the city’s growth; you look at the hospitals here in the city, the colleges of course those are organizations that even though those are actually technically not-for-profit, they do rely heavily on a healthy thriving business community and could directly benefit from this sort of a campaign. The real estate community of course; your commercial developers and brokers out there would certainly benefit from this. Even your residential realtors would see benefits from such a campaign because the more business interest there is in the city the more workers come in, and the more workers that come in the more housing that is needed. There is a direct tie obviously there as well. Certainly there is a variation of support out there; the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation is one example of an organization that has contributed to causes such as this in the past. And then of course DRED, which is our State’s Division of Resources and Economic Development. There is also grant money made available, not a lot, but again this project at the end of the day isn’t really going to cost us a whole lot in terms of what we think we will get out of it. Those are some examples of some of the organizations and aspects of the community that we think that we would be going after to help raise some of those funds. Tom Galligani And almost all of these organizations are spending a lot of money on marketing for their own selves anyway so the sort of pitch we are going to make is hopefully that a portion of what you are already spending on marketing you might want to contribute to a larger effort if you will then see a bigger benefit from, you could enhance your own individual branding effort that you are undertaking. In terms of what next steps are we looking at; how do we implement this again we are coming to you to let you know what is happening. We have already had some initial support that you have all demonstrated. The Mayor is certainly supportive of what we are doing, and the Chamber, Chris has spoken with them and the leadership of the Chamber is very interested in working on this effort. We’re in the process of finalizing an RFP that we hope to issue in the next week or so to get the word out and find a capable marketing firm; one that understand what we are trying to accomplish and help us get there. We are also going to have to start with some private sector fundraising, which Chris talked about to a good extent. That effort is certainly going to have to start up after the new year to see what we can do to get some real resources for this effort. PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 6 We figured it would make a lot of sense to do a steering committee, a community steering committee made up of folks that would not only contribute to development and guiding of this branding process but also folks that would maybe contribute to the effort too in financial terms and would have a real vested stake in what happens with this initiative. We’re hopeful this is a project that we are going to really spend a lot of time on in the early part of this year with the hopes of engaging the community, engaging all of the different constituencies over the course of the winter, the spring, and the summer in the hopes of having a product in the fall or near the end of the year that we are ready to roll out in late 2011. We wanted to show you just a few examples of what we mean about community branding and also how this can all work together to benefit more than one agency whether it is the City or the Chamber. Christopher Williams As Tom said we did take a look around, not just the New England region, but the country as well to see what are some examples of other communities that have followed this sort of a strategy. I went back to my home state and found one right back in Texas there that we would show you tonight because I think they are the perfect example of what we are looking to do here. Mesquite is a town in Texas and you can see they have the branding there with Mesquite spelled out there almost like a charcoal briquette type font with the flame above the I and then their slogan real Texas flavor. As tom goes to the next slide you will see how they have actually incorporated that in several different ways. This is their homepage here for the municipal website for Mesquite. You will see there at the upper left corner they have that very same logo up there at the top, the Mesquite Texas, real Texas flavor, and then throughout the homepage itself they have the coloring of the homepage to really match the colors within the logo itself. Now it is still a municipal website; all of the different pieces that you would normally see on Nashua’s website are similar pieces that you would see here; you have city departments, employment, online services, city council, and such right on down the line. If you go to the next slide this is actually their Chamber of Commerce website and again it is all of the pieces that a chamber website would have, very different from a municipal website; you see there it has events that are upcoming for the chamber, across the top you have the member directory for their chamber members, the calendar of events, the visit Mesquite link there with different tourism tips, but at the upper left you see the same logo up there that is promoting the umbrella brand for their community; Mesquite Texas, but underneath that you see the Chamber of Commerce, and again the coloring of that homepage does reflect the coloring of the logo itself. The next slide here is for the actual economic development office for the City of Mesquite, which is a bit different from its actual municipal website. Again you see the same logo up there in the upper left, the coloring of the homepage again reflects that umbrella brand, and this page here, the homepage for the economic development site, is all about different pieces that would be of interest to a business looking to relocate or expand into the area itself. Again three different websites that are out there, but yet all of them with separate identities still falling under that umbrella of the real Texas flavor with that Mesquite logo in the upper left. Tom Galligani In terms of other tactics that Mesquite used as a result of developing this messaging they developed a big event; a barbecue festival and a competition, which again speaks specifically to the brand name that they have rolled out, but also helps to emphasize some of the points that they were trying to make for the community. Found some local examples; Town of Londonderry just undertook and effort about a year ago, which you see the results here on their economic development webpage. Again, just to show that this is not a unique thing necessary even locally a town like Londonderry spent I think about $50,000 - $60,000 to develop this branding messaging and this website. It is not terribly unique. PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 7 Another example that is somewhat local and from the City of Providence, RI and you can see they have developed this logo based on the P in Providence and their tag line is the creative capital. One of the different tactics that they used play off of this P and emphasize this P and emphasize the creative aspect to their economy. Here is their municipal website, again the P is prominently displayed and you see the same colors and the same messaging so you know what is going on. Their economic development page within that is again a little different, it is more focused on business, but again still gives you a sense that this is all part of one initiative. Then some of the different tactics that they used, which were somewhat fairly low cost to get the word out about the brand; you see the bus stop, they have a whole series of bus advertisements at the bus stops, they have their musical vehicles, when it came time to paint their musical vehicles they said why don’t we utilize this branding as well, which again is something that really doesn’t cost anything more if you just include it in your regular operating strategies, but can help get that word out and show the branding messaging and colors and that sort of thing on our city buses for example is another way to get that message out without any real additional cost. Then you can see in this example on the lower right hand corner how this really captivated members of the business community and got the property owner of that large building to light up his windows to show that P. Again, it didn’t cost the city anything or the chamber or anybody else anything it is just another person, another entity decided to take advantage and leverage that brand to bring some attention to their own building but also obviously it helps the whole community as well in looking at that penetration of that brand, getting the most out of that brand. Again, we spoke about the implementation steps that we are looking to take. We’re certainly open to, if there is any time allowed tonight, to answer questions that you might have about the approach that we are thinking of taking and any other questions you might have. Christopher Williams If I could Alderman Tabacsko maybe just one final comment. Chairman Tabacsko Please do. Christopher Williams We are looking to, as we put that steering committee together, obviously Tom will be on there from the economic development office, representatives from the business community, and it would be great to have some active involvement from the Board of Aldermen on this particular committee as well. We will be looking to the President of the Board of Aldermen to help us kind of place someone on that committee itself. And then, of course, we will be coming back with regular updates for the entire Board just to keep you posted because certainly this is going to involve a lot of active support from the Board of Aldermen going forward once this campaign is put together and launched. It won’t just be a Chamber driven thing, it is not just a City driven thing, we do want it to be a collaborative project and as such we want to make sure we are keeping everyone as involved and in the know as we move forward as possible, which is a large reason why we are even here tonight at the very beginning of this to share this with you. We are pretty excited about it and we want to hear your questions and feedback so that we can help use that to shape the direction that we take with moving forward. Thank you for your time tonight. Chairman Tabacsko Thank you. I really do appreciate you coming in and sharing this with us. At this point, we do have about 15 minutes before the next meeting starts. I would open it up to questions from the group. Alderman McCarthy More of a comment; looking at the examples you showed I think having the consistent logo and look and feel and tag line is a really good thing to do, but I think the examples you showed also show I think one of the PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 8 pitfalls of doing that, which is the Londonderry one of business is good life is better, I think is a really nice generic slogan that talks about quality of life. The Mesquite one on the other hand while it is a really catchy logo and stuff, gives a very one-dimensional perspective, and I looked as you showed the pages from there and I didn’t walk away with that knowing anything but charcoal about Mesquite. I think you have to be careful about that trap. It is like something that you are famous for can also kind of imprison you in not having a well- rounded perspective that you show to the rest of the world. Christopher Williams Agreed. Thank you. Alderman Cookson Thank you. Tom and Chris thank you so much for the presentation this evening. You touched on some really good points, and I appreciate you bringing it before the Planning & Economic Development Committee. I had a general question with regard to another presentation that we have recently seen before the Board of Aldermen and that was from the Service Advisory Committee, and during that presentation there was a component of marketing and branding for the City and I believe that there was a dollar value estimated within that presentation. Mr. Galligani might be a little more familiar with the dollar figures associated with that. Is there any correlation or any tie-in between the two endeavors; between the Service Advisory Committee and some of their recommendations and this one? Is there any tie-in or are they independent of one another? Tom Galligani Well we hope that there is going to be a tie-in moving forward, and that is the idea of creating this umbrella brand that then downtown can tap into and utilize and leverage. A lot of the marketing that is needed for downtown again might be logos and taglines and that sort of same thing, but it is also specific initiatives to get customers downtown whether it is special promotions, specific events that are going to be advertised. But yes from our perspective it would be silly not to get the most out of this that we can and so that all of these pieces are all working together under a framework that helps to project a consistent image of Nashua. Alderman Cookson Thank you. So if the Service Advisory Committee’s recommendations are ultimately adopted by the Board of Aldermen would there be some financing available through that venue for what we are suggesting here between the cost of $80,000 and $100,000 for this effort? Tom Galligani Yeah I mean that is a great question you have. I think a lot of what the Service Advisory Committee was promoting and advocating for would probably be good funding ongoing for implementation of the marketing strategy. What we are looking here with the private sector fundraising and the City money that we have escrowed over the last year from past years, would be to create that framework. Alderman Cookson This is the front end and it would still be necessary regardless of whatever is adopted or ultimately adopted by the Service Advisory Committee recommendations. PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 9 Tom Galligani Yes. Alderman Cookson Thank you. Alderman Deane Thank you. Will a copy of this presentation be available on the City’s website any time soon? Tom Galligani It will be part of the meeting minutes of this meeting, but it is certainly reasonable for us to put it on the website so everybody can see it. Alderman Deane Could I by chance get an electronic version sent to me? Tom Galligani Absolutely. Alderman Deane How long would that take do you think off the top of your head? Tom Galligani We can send it out tomorrow. Alderman Deane Okay. Thank you very much. Tom Galligani You are welcome. Alderman Cookson Could we follow up on that? Could we just broaden that suggestion and could we have the presentation delivered to you and distributed to the group? Chairman Tabacsko Better than me I think maybe to the Legislative Office if we could get that to Sue and by virtue of this Sue would you please get that out to the rest of the board that would be wonderful. Alderman Pressly Thank you. Thank you very much for the presentation. It sounds like a great idea. I am curious is there a chance that a logo or seal of some sort has already been selected? Tom Galligani PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 10 No. Alderman Pressly Okay. Thank you. Christopher Williams We are hoping that is what this process will result in. Far be it from Tom and I to walk in and present whatever that is going to be without any input at all from anyone other than the two of us. Tom Galligani But there is also an opportunity for some interesting community building around the brand and development of the logo itself. A lot of places have done contests; you get a final 2 or 3 options and people can vote on them. Alderman Pressly I have seen one floating around that is why I was asking. You keep referencing Nashua as the Gate City. I know that is a very common and a good slogan, I was just reflecting on what I thought about the area when I first moved here and I think it had to do with the location and the proximity to all of the things that people like, like the ocean, the mountains, and the major cities. I would hope somehow that comes into play. Christopher Williams That is a great point. We all have a different perspective as to why Nashua is a great place. Part of the research when we hire a consulting firm… Alderman Pressly Did I strike a nerve with our … Alderman McCarthy I was just thinking a slogan like only an hour from where you really want to be isn’t probably the best thing. Alderman Pressly Well that might work. Christopher Williams The team that we hire they are going to do this research to find out really what the different opinions are in Nashua, but also what people outside of Nashua think of Nashua to help develop really what the authentic brand could or should be. Alderman Pressly Thank you. PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 11 Alderman Deane I don’t know whether Alderman Pressly was referring to my newly designed and recently passed out Aldermanic seal and if it was I apologize. I didn’t want to create any confusion. Everybody is developing their own seal so I have my own now along with the City’s. Alderman Pressly I have appreciated seeing that. I would like to see the latest update on that. I saw many proposals. Alderman Deane I will show you the latest. Alderman Pressly Thank you. Chairman Tabacsko In the interest of time, I will see if there are any final questions or comments. I would just add to the earlier comments I think this is a great idea and something that the company that I work for has, over the last several years, gone through a number of acquisitions and mergers and we have done a lot of that same umbrella type branding, we have a lot of different things. I understand the concept and it is important for the consistency of the message, and I was glad to see that in the presentation. I am happy to support that. At this point, before I give up the floor, I wanted to announce that this meeting tonight is taking the place, we are going to cancel next Tuesday the 21st would have been the 4th Tuesday Planning & Economic Development Committee meeting. That will not be, that is cancelled. This meeting took that place. Our next Planning & Economic Development Committee meeting will be on January 4th, the first Tuesday, and that will be a Vision 2020 session. We’re not sure if it will be held in room 208 or the auditorium so watch your agendas as they come out for that. I just wanted to let everybody know that. Alderman Cookson A comment not with regard to this evening’s presentation, but a presentation that we had I believe it was last week with regard to the Broad Street Parkway and at that meeting I think we made a request for that PowerPoint presentation. I have yet to see that come through, the electronic version. If that is available to us I would certainly like to have that. Chairman Tabacsko I know that request went in. I have not seen it myself either. I will follow up on that with a reminder. Are there any other questions or comments? COMMUNICATIONS – None UNFINISHED BUSINESS – None NEW BUSINESS - None COMMITTEE DISCUSSION - None PEDC – 12-14-10 Page 12 ADJOURNMENT MOTION BY ALDERMAN PRESSLY TO ADJOURN MOTION CARRIED The meeting was declared adjourned at 7:25 p.m. Alderman Michael Tabacsko Committee Clerk Pro Tem Proposed Joint-Branding Initiative for Nashua Time to Project a Strong Image of Nashua  Limited regional awareness of Nashua’s strengths  Decade since last strong branding opportunity  Local economy needs a push to attract businesses and visitors Time to Project a Consistent Image of Nashua  Chamber, GAD, City and others all attempting to market Nashua  efforts underfunded  efforts lack market penetration  efforts create inconsistent or competing messages/image of Nashua Opportunity  Chamber is planning a brand update  City has seed money available  Chamber & City’s Economic Development Office will partner together to identify donors Nashua Branding Goals  Establish a branding image for Nashua that:  attracts new businesses to Nashua;  attracts more visitors and customers to Nashua;  retains and attracts a strong workforce  is collaborative and consistent among Nashua’s stakeholders – City, Chamber, GAD, Colleges, Private Companies, Realtors, etc.  Provides the opportunity for distinct identities within the “umbrella brand” Branding Campaign Elements  Market Research  Brand Identity  Creative Guide and Action Plan Market Research  Paint a picture of where Nashua has been and where Nashua wants to go  Focus groups  Demographic research  Analysis of competition Brand Identity  Develop a relevant and authentic brand identity for Nashua  identify target audience  understand relative position  Identify point of difference and benefit Brand Creative Guide and Action Plan  Logo and tag line  Messaging for community, economic development and visitors  Brand-building ideas What will we get out of this?  Collaborative community brand positioning statement  “Umbrella” creative standards (logo, tag line, etc.) that can be leveraged by all stakeholders  Action Plan for brand implementation Web pages Special events to Social media augment brand Recruiting toolbox Ideas for other initiatives What will this cost?  $80,000 to $100,000  Estimates from marketing firms  Estimates from similarly-sized cities and regions  Compared with a robust, comprehensive, branding campaign for a community the size and needs of Nashua What resources are available?  City of Nashua to provide seed money  Greater Nashua Chamber of Commerce to lead private fundraising effort Fundraising Possibilities  Target those who will benefit from a stronger Nashua brand identity  Business community  Nashua-based Institutions (Hospitals and Colleges)  Real estate community  Foundation support  DRED or other State of NH Grant  Great American Downtown Implementation  Support from City and Chamber Leaders  Development of a RFP  Search for consultant  Private-sector fundraising  Establishment of Branding Steering Committee  Branding rollout by Fall 2011 Case Study: Mesquite, Texas City of Mesquite, TX Municipal Website Mesquite Chamber of Commerce City of Mesquite Economic Development Office Town of Londonderry, NH City of Providence, RI Providence, Municipal Website Providence: Business Attraction Website Providence: Implementation Implementation  Support from City and Chamber Leaders  Development of a RFP  Search for consultant  Private-sector fundraising  Establishment of Branding Steering Committee  Branding rollout by Fall 2011