Linn County helps fund “regional rebranding” effort

Linn County will spend $10,000 on an effort to develop a new identity for the Cedar Rapids-Iowa City area, supervisors decided Wednesday morning.

Supervisors voted 4-0 to approve the county contribution to the project launched in early 2010 by the Corridor Business Alliance, a group of 12 area businesses and business-support groups. District 4 Supervisor Brent Oleson was absent.

It's a volunteer project, but the alliance has hired Nashville-based North Star Destination Strategies, which bills itself as “the community and city branding specialist,” to conduct the regional research and strategic work.

By the end of the summer, North Star will deliver a new brand name and logo for the region, said John Lohman, president and publisher of Coralville-based Corridor Business Journal and chairman of the rebranding initiative.

That doesn't necessarily mean the end for the “Technology Corridor” designation dating to the late 1990s, Lohman said.

“Whatever the new brand name and logo will be will either replace or enhance the Technology Corrdidor name,” he said. “I don't think it's a foregone conclusion that name will be gone.”

North Star has also researched whether a regional identity should expand beyond the Interstate 380 area, Lohman said.

“That's part of the research,” he said. “What exactly is the corridor, what defines the corridor.”

Lohman said the other local governments, chambers of commerce, and businesses are being asked or will be asked to help fund the project.