Our Brand

The 2024 rebranding of the Chautauqua County Chamber of Commerce as the CHQ Chamber was the next logical step in a multi-year process designed to encourage a unified approach to our work and breathe new life into our organization. Rebranding was a clear directive following our strategic planning process in 2023 and followed the creation of a new mission statement: to build vital connections, provide professional resources, and champion our local businesses in Chautauqua County. We held a brand launch event in July of 2024.

If your business or organization is a member of the CHQ Chamber, we encourage you to download our Proud Member decal and post it on your website.

CHQ Chamber is proud to be an association for businesses of all sizes across the entire county.

See our 2023 strategic plan summary here.

How it's Going so Far

"This is the best use of the Chq abbreviation I've seen yet."

"what a standout logo! Love the new colors!"

"This looks so professional and fresh!"

Our Process

Working with Mr. Smith Agency from Buffalo our board and staff held a facilitated discussion to analyze our strengths and challenges, with an ultimate focus on identity. Collectively, the group came away with these ideals: innovative, unified, community builders, dynamic, connectivity, and structure. It soon became clear that we should be known as CHQ Chamber.

Our board reviewed colorways and logo options, and ultimately decided on the CHQ Chamber logo and brand you see today.

Click the slide above to see the discovery recap from Mr. Smith Agency.

Brand Guide

Communications

Social media includes live posts, video, static posts, tagging CHQ Chamber member businesses, event creation, and sharing posts. Much of our social media effort has been directed towards Facebook, as that represents a demographic that speaks to our region. We are growing a presence on LinkedIn and exploring Instagram.

We do direct email through Constant Contact for bulk messaging such as a weekly email newsletter and through our CRM system we target emails to members in specific areas or with like businesses. Anyone can sign up for CHQ Chamber Connections, our email newsletter.

We are committed to long-standing relationships with our local media. Traditional media outlets such as newspaper and radio serve our community in a variety of ways. We strive to provide timely news releases and use targeted advertising within a limited budget to work with these important community partners.

In a continuing effort to unify our message across the county we are implementing a plan to standardize custom business listing brochures for each community we serve and to make them publicly available. While we routinely drive consumers to our website business directory to find a broad range of local businesses, this is a concerted effort to reach more tourists and local college students to encourage them to Shop - Dine - Explore our small locally owned businesses and attractions.

As we head towards completion of our first full year with a new brand, the CHQ Chamber is committed to updating its communication plan to strengthen messaging and improve targeted marketing.