cycles chinook logo | the masters of chaos

Redefining the brand of a bicycle built for two.

When our clients created their first custom tandem bike, they realized they were onto something. They had a fantastic product that would fill a need for people like themselves, but they quickly realized that what they needed next was a memorable brand to build around. The Masters of Chaos were more than ready to help.

SUMMARY

Our clients turned their passion for riding and racing tandem bicycles into a business that designs custom tandems specific to their customer’s needs. MOC was tasked with renaming its company, building its brand from the ground up, and designing an ecommerce website to build awareness and grow sales.

Our Role

Brand Architecture

Logo Design

Website Design

Website Development

Web Hosting & Maintenance

Challenge

Sometimes it’s best to start with a blank slate. Our clients gave us the go-ahead to build their brand from the ground up, starting from scratch with a new name. We had to create a name that would give a nod to their proud New Hampshire heritage and stand apart from the competition. Once there, we had to build a brand that people could believe in, a logo that stands out, and a website that turns shoppers into buyers.

Solution

Build a brand that embodies its founders’ thirst for adventure. We researched, identified, and vetted a series of names that would offer personal meaning and be unique in the industry using our discovery process. Cycles Chinook became the perfect moniker for this start-up. Now, a brand foundation was needed. We crafted the brand’s personality, values, and mission and finished with its vision statement of “Encouraging Exploration and Delivering Adventure.” This has become the daily mantra for the brand and everything their bikes have to offer.

 

A custom logo with hand-crafted type speaks to the untamed nature of the company and the wind that is its namesake. When paired with the tagline “Discover your Adventure” this brand leaves no doubt that this product is designed to take its riders anywhere they want to go.

 

The next step in our process was to develop a website that would allow buyers to understand just how customized these bikes are. Tandem bicycles are tailored to the specifics of the rider – after all, you’re putting two different people on the same bike – and their website needed to accommodate both riders’ needs. We built their site in WordPress/WooCommerce to showcase their product range and depth of customizations. They now reach customers outside their local area and service multiple international riders.

Logo Design

Logo Design

Web Design & Development

Brand Architecture

Logo Design

Business Cards

How We Got There

Get in their heads and go along for the ride. Starting with a client deep-dive, we asked question after question to understand who they were, how they came to make custom bikes, and above all, why they do it. Armed with this core information, we developed names that would help bring the idea of wanderlust to life, and speak to their NH roots and their love of the outdoors. And so, Cycles Chinook was born. Chinook can mean a strong warm wind blowing down a mountainside, and also is the name given to one of the few American breeds of dogs. Chinooks were first bred in NH and were known for power, speed, and endurance. The conjured images of nature and the idea of power, speed, and endurance align perfectly with the product and resonate personally with our clients, so the name immediately stuck.

 

Our logo had to work in harmony with the name, so we turned to hand-done letterforms that felt like they were pulled from nature and we added a nod to the binary nature of the tandem with the subtle interlocking “OO” to symbolize the partnership riders have. The logo mark follows up with an overhead view of the riders in motion surrounded by rays of energy that break out of the confines of a box. Together, the logo and the wordmark work to paint the picture of a pair of riders out to explore the world around them.

Results

“We’ve always had a lot of confidence in our products. By building a solid brand behind our product we quickly reached our design and manufacturing capacity in our second year in business. By August 2021, we had to create a queue to smooth out our demand. By January 2022, the queue was full for the remainder of 2022.”
62 percent revenue increase
“We couldn’t be happier to be thriving, not just surviving during this crazy volatile time — having a solid brand that people can trust and feel connected to has certainly helped us get here.”

– Emily Lafferty
Founder & Owner, Cycles Chinook
cycleschinook.com