Brand Strategy
Decide what it is. Then design it.
Edward S. is a brand strategist and identity consultant. The specialism is positioning — the strategic foundation that makes every design decision after it easier, because there is finally something to test it against.
Twenty years advising founders, boards and the occasional airline. Edward's strategies run to a single page, on the principle that a positioning nobody can repeat from memory isn't one.
Studio North — Brand Strategy, 2024
Positioning for a design studio leaving its founder's name behind. One distinction — this studio makes things that work — settled the name, the mark, the website and the structure of every case study.
Project Super Jumbo — Brand Strategy, 2026
Strategy for a new long-haul airline. Its routes were almost all overnight, and every competitor sold the destination. Nobody was selling the night itself — so that became the position, and then the name.
Independent Work — Book, 2022
A short book on brand positioning, published by a business press and now in its fourth printing. Eleven chapters, each one page long.
Independent Work — University Brand Strategy, 2024
Brand architecture for a university that had grown nine competing faculty identities. The recommendation — one name, one voice — was adopted in full.
Within the Collective
Edward typically leads positioning on rebrands, launches and any engagement where the organisation itself is changing. Edward works with V. to reduce the strategy to a decision, and with the collective's verbal identity writers and brand designers, who turn that decision into a name and a mark.
All project enquiries are handled by Creative Director V. through Influence Design Studio.
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