7 Examples of Brand Elevation

The San Francisco Book

Think San Francisco and you’ll probably think of the icons: the Golden Gate Bridge, Coit Tower, Alcatraz, the cable cars. But spend any amount of time in SF and you’ll quickly appreciate the depth and vitality of the City by the Bay. Thousands of extraordinary restaurants, arts and culture in spades, and dozens upon dozens of neighborhoods filled with only-the-locals-know hotspots.

Now translate that into a visitors guide.

In redesigning the CVB’s flagship visitors guide — the San Francisco Book — Weaver started with a content strategy to capture the beating pulse of the destination. What’s hot? What’s new? What’s there to do in each neighborhood? What do the locals know? What San Francisco ideas are people sharing on Twitter?

From there, we framed the content to read like a city magazine: sleek, modern and clean design flush with engaging photography, all packaged in a way that integrated the Only in San Francisco brand.

The design also took a new approach to the city’s icons. From our collaboration with the CVB, we all agreed: The cover had to demonstrate San Francisco without any words.

The end result was a compelling visitors guide that the San Francisco CVB was proud to distribute and share, not just with visitors, but their membership as well. But don’t take our word for it. Here’s what Chief Marketing Officer Matt Stiker had to say:

“We really appreciate all your hard work on this; from our conversations back in May … you guys have really delivered a wonderful product that ‘feels’ San Francisco, but also feels very new, current, and modern while retaining its usefulness and practicality.

In short, GREAT STUFF, and THANK YOU.”

Wyoming Official Travelers Journal

In 2009, Weaver embarked on a redesign of the Wyoming Official Travelers Journal, the flagship magazine and guide for Wyoming Travel and Tourism (WTT). In our collaboration with WTT staff, it was agreed that our primary goal was to bolster their Forever West brand with a modern visitors magazine… to take the brand promise of the state’s wide open spaces and frontier heritage and merge it with an updated look.

The resulting magazine announces this bold new direction on the cover: a simple, clean presentation where the image of a fisherman beneath the Tetons speaks volumes. Inside, we delivered a guide with

Large, impactful photography that spoke to the state’s wide-open spaces
A clean and consistent design that separated editorial from advertising content
And a content structure and navigation that catered to two distinct audiences: those who knew where they wanted to go, and those who knew what they wanted to do.

Visit Dallas Magazine

The Dallas CVB wanted to take their official visitors guide and make it stand out more at some of its key distribution points — like DFW Airport. Weaver approached them with a concept that mixed the high-end stylishness of a city magazine with the approachability and tone of an insider’s guidebook. The result was Visit Dallas Magazine, a semiannual glossy publication that perfectly combines the savviness, cultural richness and approachability that is Dallas.

Philadelphia Visitors Guide and Website

Discovery work is the foundation of our design and strategy. In the case of the Philadelphia CVB, this foundation had to support both a redesigned website and their flagship publications — the Official Visitors Guide and Meeting Professionals Guide.

Employing our five-stage process, we gathered critical info on the destination brand, brainstormed and collaborated with the bureau, and produced a creative brief. This document not only outlined the redesign’s objectives, but served as a guide for all creative work down the road.

As the collaboration blossomed, a clear positioning statement emerged: Philadelphia is a full-on fusion of old and new, historic and modern, trendy and traditional.

This statement served to build a clear direction for our content strategy. Visitors would “match their cravings,” “experience the dynamic,” and “find their Philadelphia.”

This discovery work helped the Philadelphia CVB establish a clear identity for their marketing outreach materials — an identity that ultimately permeated their website and publications.

Las Vegas Publications

It’s one of the most visible tourism brands in the world: Las Vegas. In the 13 years that Weaver has published for the LVCVA, we’ve seen their brand take many forms, from the more recent “Vegas Alibi” campaign to the iconic phrase “What Happens Here, Stays Here.” For every publication we’ve done, our team of designers and editors has been dialed in to the LVCVA and their ad agency to ensure their brand permeates every page.

It’s no mistake that the covers of today’s Visitors Guide and Travel Planners Guide bare the design hallmarks of the Vegas Alibi campaign. This consistency not only helps connect the guides to the collateral and advertising in the LVCVA’s multimillion-dollar marketing budget, but it also conveys the credibility of the brand. Inside each guide, Weaver’s design and editorial teams have taken the brand to a deeper level by offsetting photography with substantive content to convey the undeniable allure, sophistication and freshness of Las Vegas.

Grayline Explorer

Attending a 100th birthday party is pretty cool, especially if it is to celebrate the century mark for one of the world’s most trusted travel brands. In 2010, our friends at Grayline Worldwide are marking such an occasion, and to celebrate their history — and their global collection of tours — Weaver is producing a collector’s edition magazine.

For 32 pages, the Grayline Explorer: 100th Anniversary Edition is saturated with the world’s most beautiful locations — Istanbul, Costa Rica, Australia, Brazil, Prague and more — and the compelling tours that give global travelers a deeper experience at each one.

Designed as a magazine that can be read by Grayline’s clients and those seeking more information on their tours, the Grayline Explorer delves into the company’s thematic tours — culture, adventure, culinary and ecotravel — as well as the best tours from each continent. The end result is a magazine that elevates Grayline’s tour operators to the forefront of one of the world’s most trusted, reliable travel brands.

Seattle Professional Travel Planners Guide

It is one of North America’s most majestic cities: Seattle. A glistening metropolis on a beautiful sound, where open space, culture, and a love of food and wine combine to make it red-hot destination for group travel.

They call it “Metronatural.” Equal parts nature and urban sophistication.

Our task: convey that brand promise on every page on content.

For the main group tour and travel professional promotion piece of Seattle’s Convention and Visitors Bureau, we took a progressive approach to merging rich, saturated photography with compelling itineraries that inspire the guide’s professional audience. Interior content such as 6 Ideas for Green Itineraries, Girls’ Getaway and Beyond Seattle – Exploring the Pacific Northwest were specially geared for planners to lift and place in their itineraries, while maintaining a strong call to action to utilize the CVB’s staff of travel trade pros.