NORTHSTAR-AT-TAHOE
For decades Northstar has been one of Lake Tahoe's most popular "family" ski resorts. Serious skiers and snowboarders walked into the office on Monday morning's bragging about their weekends at Squaw Valley (now Palisades), Heavenly, or Kirkwood. Those who spent the weekend at "Flatstar" always had an excuse: "We were with the kids," "Susie's parent's were with us," or "Traffic getting into Squaw was a nightmare so we went to Northstar." Our challenge was to change all that, and give skiers and boarders of all levels an unapologetic reason to love (and identify with) Northstar as a mountain and a brand.
Our solution began with a redesign of the Northstar logo and the creation of an entirely new brand identity system ... a system that broke the mountain into 5 separate areas, each with a distinct "audience" it serves: Mt Pluto for the groomed crowd, The Backside for black diamond skiers and boarders, Lookout Mountain for the mogul seekers, Terrain Parks for freestylers, and Schaffer's Camp for kids. This system helped visitors find their place on the mountain, and allowed us to promote and market each section individually with merchandise/influencers/ads that cater to its relevant audience.
IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE STEEP
TO BE EXTREME.
The changes at Northstar had to be more than cosmetic. For the rebranding effort to work, the experience had to change too. That was accomplished by installing terrain park features all over the mountain turning flat, groomed runs into more extreme runs. Legendary snow-park designers Frank Wells and Chris “Gunny” Gunnarson were hired to design the new terrain parks, and some guy named Shaun White helped create Tahoe's first "superpipe," where he set up residence and trained for the 2014 Olympics. These efforts led to Northstar being named the country's #2 terrain park by Transworld Snowboard Magazine. Who's bragging now?
Once the on-mountain changes were completed, we were able to market and position Northstar as a far more challenging and aspirational destination for skiers in the Bay Area, and
across the country (as part of the expanding Vail Resorts portfolio). The "fun for all" tagline maintained a connection with Northstar's historical "family" positioning, while expanding it to include expert skiers and boarders. Guerilla and pop-up installations in the Bar Area promoted the new terrain parks in BART stations, along the Embarcadero, and in public skateparks.
CREDITS: CD: Jeff Huggins DESIGNER: Cris Logan, Ken Cook CWs: Michael Bettendorf, Jeff Huggins, Mark Krajan AD: Kevin Gammon, Michelle Edens