The Southern Midcoast Maine Chamber is planning to undertake a full-scale rebranding venture, and they are seeking suggestions from the community.

The chamber’s executive director Cory King said the chamber has a vague name, and it’s difficult for people who are not from this area to recognize it.

“We often get calls from people asking for Rockland County Chamber of Commerce and others located in this area. It gets difficult to explain to them who we are. Moreover, our chamber has almost the same acronym as Southern Maine Community College, and people most often get confused.”

The Southern Midcoast Maine Chamber’s current logo. Contributed

King added that the chamber’s logo is also a little nondescriptive.

“Some people say our logo looks like a bird landing on the leaves, and others say it looks like an open book, but we are not sure what it looks like. We are not sure if we will go with a new logo or if we will come up with a word-based logo,” he said.

King said the chamber’s role has changed over time, and they have been discussing some changes and evolution that need to happen for some time now.

“With new programming coming up, we thought it’s time the chamber should freshen up its name and image to meet the needs of the modern community and modern businesses and decided to do the rebranding,” said King.

King shared a bit of history about the chamber. Back in the ’90s, the Bath chamber and Brunswick chamber decided to merge, and it was called the Bath-Brunswick chamber. Later in the mid-‘2000s, the businesses in the chamber wanted a name that was more inclusive and ended up doing a whole rebranding, and the chamber got its name SMMC in 2005.

SMMC aims to promote awareness about business and communities in the greater Southern Midcoast Maine region by providing networking, marketing, and advocacy opportunities for its members.

The chamber conducted an online rebranding survey last month where they asked people what changes they would like to see in the chamber’s logo and what colors and images would represent the Midcoast region.

“Our marketing team will review the survey results and will discuss it during a meeting in mid-September and later present options to our board of directors this fall,” said King. “We may conduct another survey with the community if we cannot decide on the best name,”

If things go as planned, the chamber’s new brand and logo will be released at their 2022 Annual Awards Dinner in March, said King.