Creative Inc / Irish Graphic Design, Branding and Advertising

A precious metals and wealth investment company, previously called Gold and Silver Investments, as part of their planned expansion into Europe, Creative Inc rebranded them as GoldCore. “Our communications strategy was being hampered by different names and websites in different territories (Gold Investments, Gold and Silver Investments Limited, gold.ie and goldassets.co.uk) so we decided to simplify things and change name and rebrand. Creative helped us come up with the new name GoldCore, designed an excellent visual identity and created strong marketing material which will help us to establish GoldCore (www.goldcore.com ) as a brand which is an important step in expanding our company and growing internationally” says Mark O’Byrne, Managing Director.

The name Gold and Silver Investments was restricting the potential for the company to both diversify and expand into new markets as it was more of a descriptor name which focused only on one part of their offering (precious metals), ignored the wealth management aspect of their business and was already in use as a name in other markets like the UK. In addition it wasn’t a very strong brand name and would present trademark issues down the line as the business expanded. “The name GoldCore allowed us to hold onto some of the positive equity (Gold and Silver Investments has featured heavily in Irish and International media) associated with the company while at the same time creating a much stronger brand which includes the dotcom” comments Niall Corcoran, Commercial Director of Creative Inc.

The new visual identity is which more suited to their vision of becoming the top gold bullion investment company worldwide. The new look created the perfect opportunity to use the product offering – gold, and create an identity and language which was completely suited to the market they occupied, suave, sophisticated and very serious. The use of gold foil, minimal colours and imagery, with classic type that mimicked the columns in financial publications and quotes which allude to the significance of gold in a wealth investment plan, helped put GoldCore firmly on the map.
The hexagonal shape of the GoldCore logo comes from the unusual atomic configuration of the smallest piece of 24 karat gold possible, where 16 gold atoms form a hexagonal cage, a quality which is unique to Gold.

As Stephen Flood, Director of GoldCore explains, “the rebrand has had a huge impact on our business. Our International accounts have increased by 50% YOY, our wealth management offering is better understood by our clients, our brand awareness internationally has increased in the press and we believe that our sales will grow by 35% this year of which 20% can be attributed to the rebranding. This figure will increase as we expand our markets and service range. We are not seen as an Irish Company anymore by international clients”.
The rebrand of GoldCore was awarded a silver bell at the recent 2010 Institute of Creative Advertising and Design Awards.