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‘Main Street’ too confusing, so 10-year-old MSWB changes name
by Gregory R. Norfleet · News · September 29, 2016
“Main Street” in Main Street West Branch needed to go, the group said.
Too confusing.
Some folks thought, incorrectly, the organization only helped Main Street businesses or, at most, the downtown.
So, 10 years since starting in 2006, the group adopted a new name: West Branch Community Development Group.
“We want to include people all over town and south of Interstate 80,” President Shane Staker said.
Program Director Kevin Rogers said the group did not even know changing the name would go over well with parent group Main Street Iowa, but it did. If CDG keeps referring to MSI on pamphlets and in programs, and continues to operate under MSI guidelines, then there is no problem.
“This is a community group, not an exclusive group,” Staker said.
With a new name, the CDG introduced a new logo. Rogers said the previous logo, a green circle with three abstract blades of grass — or three tongues of fire, or three curving feathers — in the shape of a “W,” was too abstract for those who had not heard an explanation behind the design.
“We wanted something timeless,” Rogers said. “Maybe now’s the time to move with it.”
CDG members Tara Langley of Cotton Creek Mill quilt shop and Erin Morrison-Vincent of Little Lights Events/Nature’s Grace Photography collaborated on the logo, Staker said.
Langley holds a graphic design degree while Morrison-Vincent holds a marketing degree.
“We lucked out,” Staker said. “They are very generous and gifted.”
Rogers said the new logo’s shape reminds him of the famous Fabulous Las Vegas sign and text reads “Historic West Branch” with “Community Development Group” and “2006” below.
Staker and Rogers said the new logo’s design makes it easier to overlay on photographs so they show through. And CDG can swap out the smaller text for, say, “Eat. Shop. Explore.” or “Explore Exit 254,” whatever the group finds most fitting.
When the group formed Main Street West Branch in 2006, it did so under the name “Friends of Historic West Branch.” Rogers said the group continues to use that name for tax purposes, but will now change that, too, to West Branch Community Development Group.
Rogers said MSWB members had attended MSI events and met other groups with “Main Street” in their name, yet only recently asked about it.
“Most of them changed their names,” Rogers said of the groups he encountered at a recent event in Des Moines.
The CDG already started using the new name and co-sponsored last week’s Volunteer Appreciation Event with the Hoover Presidential Foundation and Herbert Hoover Presidential Library-Museum.
However, the new name does not become official — as far as the government is concerned — until Dec. 30.
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