Are you ready for more Sault logos?

Now that Sault Ste. Marie has a new logo and city branding, should other city-funded agencies like the Downtown Association, Tourism Sault Ste. Marie and the Economic Development Corp. follow suit?

"One of the recommendations that came out of the.... first stage of the branding discussion, was having a kind of holistic brand that could be used for other community partners or champions," Josh Ingram, the Downtown Association's executive director, told his board last night.

"The EDC will obviously have to rebrand. And Sault Tourism will obviously have to rebrand, because the crux of their brand is the old city's brand."

Ingram said he conducted "a kind of a branding study" when he joined the Downtown Association in 2016.

"It was decided that we're going to hold back until we found out what the city's new brand was."

Approved by city council on May 21, the Sault's new brand and visual identity have not been universally lauded.

Pretty much everyone agrees the Downtown Association's current logo is a bit run down at the heels.

But should the pending rebrand build on the controversial new city logo, or try to develop something better from scratch?

"You say there's a couple of different organizations that are going to be branding. Why wouldn't we, along with them, get together and see if we can utilize the city branding?" asked Frank Gaccione, the Downtown Association's treasurer.

"I think we've waited long enough. We're at the point now where we can make a decision," Gaccione said.

Ingram doesn't know what his board will decide, but he tells SooToday no name change is anticipated.

"We will still be the Downtown Assocation, absolutely," he said.

"We're big champions of the logo in our office. We took a stance on it. I love the logo personally. So I would have no problem with that. Obviously it's the will of the board."

"I hope that we'll take some sort of version of the logo. I don't know how much they're allowed to change or augment or if it's just the logo in a specific colour that we always get to use."

Future SSM spearheaded the design initiative that resulted in the city's new logo.

It was agreed last night that Ingram and the Downtown Association's communications subcommittee will now reach out to Future SSM to determine that organization's wishes regarding city-funded agencies using variants of the new logo.