Industry
- Agriculture
Service
- Brand Development
- Strategic Communications
Bringing Specialty Breeders Together With AgTech
Breeding Insight, an Agricultural Research Service initiative based in Ithaca, New York, helps small specialty crop and animal breeders adopt technology to address breeding challenges.
They approached us in preparation for the launch of their proprietary software, a tool that would enable public breeders to record, analyze, and share data as they develop new and better specialty seed varieties and animal breeds.
Breeding Insight needed a name, a visual identity, and messaging pillars to introduce its new software and communicate its value to specialty plant and animal breeders.
Breeding Insight’s new software users care deeply about their work but have limited time to waste, and highly restricted financial and physical resources. They rely on basic tools like Excel to record data, but these tools don’t facilitate the sharing or analysis of information in a way that would make their jobs easier and the end results better. Plus, they’re lovingly known to be resistant to newfangled technology, and anything that could their already stressful job more complicated.
Our team worked with the Breeding Insight team, moving through a strategic naming process toward a brand identity that felt relevant and approachable. DeltaBreed was chosen for dual function: Ecologically, deltas are a river zone where the water goes from flowing in a steady direction to being unconfined and free. The idea of a delta relates to this software as it’s where data can flow from one breeder’s records into the unconfined community of breeders. “Breed” harkens back to the parent brand, Breeding Insight. It also serves as a functional identifier, connecting with the breeders themselves.
As we approached the visual brand development, we needed to be sure we weren’t alienating any particular industry within the world of breeders. For example, a blue logo might connect too strongly to aquaculture. An animal motif would alienate specialty seed breeders.
Our creative team crafted a logo to appeal to the audience of specialty breeders deeply committed to their work. The concept alludes to the overlapping of workflows of many isolated breeders, coming together to make a streamlined path forward. The finished ADA-compliant logo uses greens and blues to nod to crop lines and flowing water, keeping this mark from alienating any type of breeder. We carefully considered how the DeltaBreed logomark would relate to its “parent brand” Breeding Insight, and emphasized visual cohesion through the color palette and typography chosen.
With a strong visual identity determined, the Agency 29 team developed a Messaging Strategy based on foundational pillars of affordability, ease of use, efficiency, and accuracy. The Messaging Strategy focused on easing the barriers to adoption to benefit and foster success for specialty breeders.
About the Client:
Breeding Insight is a U.S. Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service initiative hosted at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. The initiative creates new opportunities for specialty breeders in assimilating tools, technologies, and methods to catalyze the routine and accessible use of genomic insights toward more healthy, nutritious, and sustainable specialty crops and animals.
