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FEAA
Corporate identity
The customer
The Faculty of Economics and Business Management (FEAA) is part of the "Al. I. Cuza" University of Iaşi, the first Romanian university. It is one of the largest Romanian faculties that specialise in this domain and has over 130 members of the teaching staff and over 11,000 students.
The challenge
After 1989, the former Institut de Ştiinte Economice (ISE - Institute of Economic Sciences) underwent a thorough process of restructuring. Some of the main results were the radical change of the curriculum, rebuilding the institutional framework and improving the quality of the teaching staff.
After more than 50 years without any major changes, the institution decided to embark on an organisational rebranding process geared towards finding its own individual ground and changing its old identity.
The first step was taken in 2000, by changing the old name to ‘Faculty of Economics and Business Management (FEAA)’.
The Imola Communications PR agency was entrusted with the advertising campaign. In its turn, Imola Communications asked Grapefruit to assess the current situation and design a new image for their customer.
The solution
The image suggested by Grapefruit helped FEAA come across as a top academic institution, up-to-date with the latest developments and technologies, and with a pragmatic approach to teaching and research; in short, able to compete with top similar institutions abroad.
The new logo plays on symbols related to the academic environment - books -, and to humanism - the protective hand -, and manages to combine them into a modern and original image.
The chosen colour scheme and fonts create a distinct identity, easily recognisable in the Romanian and international academic environments.
The next step was designing a set of basic advertising materials which were believed to be of paramount importance - opinion shared by the customer, as well. Such materials were business cards, headed paper, envelopes, brochures, diaries, and promotional items, to name but a few.
It was time then to develop a consistent and intuitive range of signs and symbols to be used by the customer. Their importance was obvious given the high number, degree of spreading and diversity of the display areas that serve educational purposes within the institution.
When designing the internal and external signs and symbols, Grapefruit paid additional care to the customer's explicit request to have end-products that would withstand environmental factors, together with the wear and tear associated with being displayed on a large scale. At the same time, however, Grapefruit never lost sight of the need for its deliverables to have the desired visual impact, too.
The special attention that was paid to information design, character visibility and colour-coding ensured that all the customer's needs were met, a fact also confirmed by the public's positive reaction.
Due to the customer's extended organisational framework, identity guidelines needed to be drawn during the last part of the project. They would provide essential and accurate information regarding the way in which the new identity should be exploited.
This manual was confirmed to be a complete success because it provided technical information and details regarding the new identity and its most common implementations in a clear and well-structured form. Furthermore, the guidelines became an effective management device used by the academic and administrative staff, as well as other contracted agencies and institutional partners.
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