PLAY LIKE A GIRL UNVEILS NEW LOGO, SIGNALS BRAND EVOLUTION
Nonprofit Leader Prepares Next Generation of Female Athletes for
Success On and Off the Field
NASHVILLE, February 1, 2018 — Play Like a Girl today announced the launch of its new visual identity and brand campaign, Game On!, conveying the organization’s desire to help girls realize their full potential through sport participation and active living.
The new branding supports Play Like a Girl’s strategic push to keep girls, and their needs, at the forefront of their plans to build a pipeline of diverse, talented and motivated women athletes in the workforce. Underpinning the brand positioning is a set of core values, among them commitment and loyalty to keeping girls in the game, a collaborative spirit, “seeing the best in every girl” and believing that by exposing girls to sport they will find success beyond the field of play.
Play Like a Girl President and CEO Dr. Kimberly Clay said its brand is much more than a logo or tagline. “We’re strategically rethinking how we present ourselves to stakeholders in all areas of our work, ensuring our actions match our words and creating experiences that improve girls’ lives,” she said. “We want to define ourselves by giving girls in need the opportunity to play on a team and gain the confidence they need to stand on their own.”
Play Like a Girl Marketing Co-Chair, Rachel White (Sales Manager, WeWork) said the organization’s brand strategy was influenced by internal and external research — like the findings in the Ernst & Young survey of global female leaders released in 2015 — that continues to point to sport as a significant factor in advancing women at all levels.
“The fact that sport is a source of motivation for women is not a big surprise to us, but we feel that Play Like a Girl has the unique opportunity to help girls harness some of the natural properties of sport early in life so they can better control their professional lives,” said White. “That’s clearly what the next generation girl needs from us and we’re confident in our ability to step up and provide programs and services that will set her on a path to lifelong success—even beyond the field of play. So it is ‘game on’ for Play Like a Girl.”
Evolving the brand identity
The new brand offers a richer articulation of the organization’s mission and vision, and uses a simplified spectrum of vibrant colors and sub-brands to reflect the diverse backgrounds of the Play Like a Girl community. The most prominent part of the new brand identity is Play Like a Girl’s new brand mark, which represents the motion and flow of a young female athlete’s life and learning. It also tells the story of young women working together as a team to achieve their goals and create better lives for themselves. The brand tagline, ‘Inspiring Play. Unlocking Potential.’ captures the essence of that transformation.
The new brand also prominently features an exclamation mark representing the “I” in “G!RL” in its brand name, a symbol of Play Like a Girl’s commitment to turn the schoolyard taunt “you play like a girl” into a declaration of pride that rallies girls together everywhere. Ultimately, it is a symbol of the organization’s promise to help girls become unstoppable women.
The evolved brand identity, including the most comprehensive brand design system ever introduced within Play Like a Girl, will be rolled out to all Play Like a Girl products, communications, and experiences, starting with the Play Like a Girl Summit later this month, and across the organization beginning in the spring. The new identity and brand positioning will be used in advertising to promote a national rollout of a newly-packaged Play Like a Girl Clubs program, the organization’s active play toolkits and tipsheets, community outreach and events, among others.
New marketing supports launch
The Game On! campaign features five young girls, Maiya, Kendra, Jade, Amber and Trinity, ranging in age from 10 to 14, who star in the campaign images which all provoke a feeling of strength, confidence and pure joy. Whether it is the confidence girls gain from playing on a team like Maiya who plays a different sport each season or the incredible leadership and social skills a shy homeschool student like Amber gets from softball, the campaign celebrates the power of sport to unlock girls’ potential.
Game On! will debut as part of promotions for the third annual Play Like a Girl Summit in Nashville on February 16-17, 2018. The print ads, which will launch on International Women’s Day in March, feature the hero campaign image of Cecelia Townes, an Atlanta-based attorney and member of Play Like a Girl’s Board of Directors, with the five girls. In addition to print, the campaign spans radio, digital and social. New radio spots debut in several markets across the organization’s national footprint in August, expanding to a broader digital advertising push in mid-August.
Play Like a Girl is aiming to create an environment of girl empowerment and positive social engagement. Using the hashtag #gameon followed by a name, a girl’s mother, father, teammate, mentor or coach can issue a call to action for social messages of encouragement and love to any girl in need of positive support, cheering her on through the power of positive affirmation.
“Girls drop out of sports at twice the rate of boys by age 14, and as an organization, we should be there to encourage girls to stay in sports and reap the long-term, personal benefits whether they go “pro” in sport or in science,” said Clay. “Our desire is for our donors, partners and participants to see Play Like a Girl as a game changer for girls and women in sport.”
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About Play Like a Girl
Play Like a Girl is a national 501(c)3 charitable organization founded in 2004. Our mission is to ensure that every girl reaches her full potential by providing girls ages 9-13 an opportunity—and in many cases, their only chance—to participate in sport and physical activity. We offer programs and resources designed to transform girls’ motivation into an “I am unstoppable” attitude. It is our goal to help girls everywhere find the courage to do things beyond the field of play that they never thought possible. We believe that girls given the opportunity to play on a team become women who have the confidence to stand on their own. For more information, visit iplaylikeagirl.org, and join us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter @iplaylikeagirl.
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