Forming the Junction
Moving a former CrossFit gym forward with a dynamic new brand.
The Right Time for a Change
When Junction Fitness, formerly known as CrossFit DSP, came to Knight Eady, the brand was at a turning point in the gym’s history. The gym had been through many changes in 2020, including a change in ownership, navigating the shutdown from the COVID-19 pandemic, and finally reopening and adding a HIIT training methodology, X4. The new owner, Aaron, wanted a name and a brand that more appropriately represented the new vision for the gym, the gym culture and the class offerings. Knight Eady partnered with the gym to walk them through a brand identity discovery complete with an audience insights study and brand launch campaign.
A Winning Game Plan
Knight Eady walked Aaron and his team through a strategic branding process to unveil and strengthen the gym’s identity with both internal and external audiences. The branding process yields a sustainable visual direction for years to come and focuses on the brand’s most vital characteristics to ensure the identity presented accurately represents the brand’s values. The brand identity discovery included a series of meetings between Knight Eady strategists and creatives and the gym’s representatives to uncover the brand’s key characteristics, the target audience, the message and the ultimate brand goals.
Additionally, the accompanying marketing campaign needed to share the right message at the right time to the right audience. Knight Eady sought to understand who the gym’s potential customers are and what their lives look like each day to make sure the brand’s new visual identity and messaging would stand out and resonate with the audience. Knight Eady augmented the brand identity research with audience discovery research to identify the attributes that influence the gym’s audience and make informed targeting decisions in the marketing strategy.
The New Brand
Our strategy and creative teams brought the final Junction Fitness brand to life through three levels of brand consideration: brand positioning, distinctive brand attributes, and creative strategy. The brand positioning statement is the statement that tells why Junction Fitness is relevant and credible in the fitness industry and defines its audience while also outlining the specific aspects of the brand that differentiate them from the rest.
Brand Purpose: To intersect the confidence found through fitness with our everyday lives.
Brand Position: Junction Fitness provides a valuable fitness solution for individuals seeking to achieve personal goals or physical performance standards with the most qualified coaches and effective programming in a community atmosphere.
The corresponding brand attributes are the various identifying characteristics that help the brand take shape and allow the audience to connect with the brand. These attributes include the mission and vision statement, core values and brand purpose.
Mission Statement: Our mission is to bring the Temple community together, no matter where they are in their fitness journey, and provide the perfect blend of fitness solutions to help each member achieve their goals.
Vision Statement: At Junction Fitness, our vision is to provide the road map for fitness achievement.
Srengthening the Core (Values)
Keep the Path Clear – While everyone has an individual experience on their fitness journey, we are still on the path together. As a community, we have a responsibility to look out for each other and remove any roadblocks we can. Whether it is cleaning facilities, providing a word of encouragement or helping a member get back on track, we all move forward stronger as a community and we get there faster when we keep the path clear.
Embrace the Journey – A fitness journey is like a continuous series of checkpoints, which is why we embrace the mentality to make the journey worth it. The path can be challenging, cumbersome and tedious, and setbacks are OK. However, reaching each checkpoint feels even better when we make the time it took to get there just as powerful as the goal. This means a shift in our perspective to see problems as opportunities, celebrating the milestones and ultimately making fitness fun. We strive to make every moment of the work towards your goals worth it.
Travel with the Pack – When you join Junction Fitness, we guarantee that you won’t be on this journey alone. Our coaches and community are committed to your fitness goals and your overall health and well-being. In this community, we want you to feel cared for, valued and supported. We know when you have a community that cares for you, it’s easier to care for yourself. At Junction Fitness, our pack has each other’s back.
Trust Your Guide – Whether fitness is a path you’ve navigated your entire life or something new, we believe you should never navigate the fitness journey alone. At Junction Fitness, we prioritize creating an environment of trust with our coaches, staff and the greater gym community as they guide you towards your overall goals. From ensuring proper technique to encouraging you when you’re tired, our coaches guide you every step of the way. All you have to do is commit to the adventure and you can trust that your coaches and community will help you get there!
Chase the Horizon – With fitness, the journey never really ends. Whether it is reaching a new personal record, a weightloss goal or stress management, at Junction Fitness, we strive always to keep you hungry. All we ask is you commit to keep moving forward and we promise always to keep motivating and innovating in return.
The last part of the brand identity process is to define the creative strategy. The brand’s creative strategy is the single most important idea that every stakeholder can rally around creatively for inspiration and directional focus. It is the idea that connects all elements of the brand expression across all touchpoints, including the brand’s events, partners and clients.
After establishing the brand story, the visual elements began to unfold. The primary mark was designed to feature the “JF” initials of the new name in a minimal way while also subtly representing the idea of two paths coming together. The mark is clean and modern yet bold and energetic – a perfect embodiment of the newfound direction and spirit of the gym. The color palette of black and tan reflected the natural tones of a road, while inciting feelings of optimism and enlightenment. The supporting elements of the brand stayed within the theme to show continuous journeys coming together, representing the blend of the CrossFit and X4 class offering and the gym culture of working out together.
Getting the Win
To shape the creative strategy, our team used the brand archetype theory to personify human behaviors and provide a roadmap that enables a brand to more accurately appeal to a given desire with a specific personality. From the discovery process, it was clear the gym’s archetype was the Magician. Magician brands align with the basic human desire for power and take people on a journey of transformation through the experience of a magical moment. The Magician markets itself by creating a story for its customers. They seek to mesmerize their customers by the possibilities and promise that the brand has to offer. This insinuates a fascination, creating a strong following and customer loyalty that makes them consistently come back for more. From this understanding, the brand story for Junction Fitness was created.
Brand Manifesto:
When two or more things come together, they form a junction. Regardless of where they are coming from or why they are coming together, they begin to work together toward the same goal the moment those different paths meet at a junction. At Junction Fitness, we work to understand where you are in your fitness journey to help you get to where you’re trying to go. Whether it’s coming for an effective workout, to be trained by one of our coaches, to be more active with your family, or to be a part of our inclusive community, coming to Junction Fitness is a guaranteed hour of your day where everyone is working out together. Because together, we are stronger, more encouraged and more motivated to reach our individual goals.
Once you become a part of our community, you don’t have to take this journey alone. Our elite coaches become your guide to help you navigate the path. While we are all on the same path towards fitness, individual experiences can vary. New intersections, distractions and roadblocks can cause setbacks. That’s why our coaches help each member stay focused and our encouraging community keeps you motivated by traveling with you. Junction Fitness is more than just another road to chase, but the point in the journey where you finally figure out where to go and the support to help you get there.
With our hybrid offering of CrossFit and X4, we blend two of the top fitness methodologies under one roof that allows us to meet our members wherever they are in fitness and bring them all together to be a part of our strong community. No matter what class you take or service you use, we strive to always provide you with an empowering atmosphere, the best workout and fair pricing that makes being a part of our community worth it.
The Continuous Journey Forward
A brand is only as strong as the rollout. Upon the brand’s completion, Knight Eady consulted with Junction Fitness and developed a comprehensive marketing and communications plan. The plan included a consultation with the gym on integrating the marks in the facility, a complete website redesign and development and a three-month launch campaign to tell the brand story to its target public. The gym is currently in the process of the brand rollout and has generated new media attention, reignited their social media presence and driven increased potential new member traffic on their website and in their gym.
