The Francis E. Parker Memorial Home, a 110-year old aging services provider with six campuses in New Jersey came to Ideon with a desire to grow regionally and be recognized industry-wide. Based on comprehensive research, Ideon’s braintrust encouraged Parker to aim higher. By going beyond the aging services category—seeking new partnerships and alliances with organizations in other fields, and leading a national conversation about what it means to age in America—Parker could emerge as a much-needed leader in and beyond the category.
Our audience research helped bolster this strategy and delivered a second knockout opportunity, to brand Parker as the only human organization in a category that is generally mistrusted, feared, and avoided until absolutely necessary. Building on these findings, we developed a new brand platform, story, name, tagline, messaging and design to elevate Parker’s brand from a regional operator, internally focused on the gold standard of service delivery, to an inspiring organization poised to lead the conversation around aging, with a reach far beyond its New Jersey footprint.
The new brand gives long legs to Parker, with 40 newly trained employee brand ambassadors, all well versed in their new brand values, skills and behaviors, and ready to train all 800 employees to serve as champions for the aging. The new brand was launched to great fanfare in May 2017, and new iterations of the website and campaign are planned for 2018.
Roberto Muniz, President and CEO of Parker, Inc., is a fan, saying: “Since 1907, Parker has been challenging, changing, and expanding the idea of what it means to grow older in America. But we realized our brand was not an accurate reflection of who we really are and how we conduct business. The brand felt staid and out-of-step with the times. Ideon’s dynamic rebranding allowed us to engage the world as an inspiring aging services organization. Armed with a new name, human story and vibrant design we are better positioned than ever to discover ways to make aging more manageable, relatable and enriching for all of society. On May 11, 2017, we unveiled Parker’s new brand and our goal to make aging part of life to major fanfare—and we celebrated Ideon’s branding work too. We’re thrilled and continue to see Ideon as our close partner.”
