The not-for-profit landscape is shifting, with organisations rethinking how they connect with their communities. For Youth Off The Streets, a charity dedicated to supporting vulnerable young Australians, this meant refreshing its brand for the first time in over a decade.
Telum spoke with the charity's Head of Communications and Public Affairs, Karen Penning, to unpack the vision behind the transformation, the challenges of balancing legacy with change, and how they're ensuring the new identity resonates with young people, donors, and the wider community.
After a decade, the charity is undergoing a rebrand. Could you share the vision / purpose behind this transformation, and what communications strategies are being employed to ensure its success?
It has been over 10 years since Youth Off The Streets last reviewed its brand. A lot has changed in that time - not only in our organisation but in the Australian not-for-profit sector and society as a whole. During the process of developing our Strategic Plan 2024-2028, it became clear that to achieve our big strategic goals, we needed to ensure our brand reflected who we are today and that it is relevant, meaningful and inspiring to our external audiences.
Throughout the six-month brand strategy project with Today Design, we consulted extensively with staff, volunteers and young people, as well as sector partners, donors and other funders.
Since the conclusion of the project, I’ve focussed on change communications plans for our internal and external stakeholders. In both cases, we used a range of tactics to explain the rationale for the rebrand and share the outcomes with a heavy focus on conversations - whether in the form of group presentations, team meetings or personal phone calls to supporters of our work. The feedback so far has been very encouraging and enthusiastic.
What challenges have you faced in aligning the new brand with the existing perception of Youth Off The Streets among stakeholders?
We were founded over 30 years ago by Father Chris Riley AM, a passionate advocate for the rights of our most vulnerable children and young people. Through his vision and dedication, Youth Off The Streets has grown from a founder-led organisation into a highly skilled team of experts who provide wraparound services to children and young people in NSW and Queensland.
Our challenge in this brand revitalisation was to honour our grassroots history and Father Riley’s legacy while establishing our identity as a contemporary, collaborative and holistic youth services organisation.
I believe we’ve achieved that with our rebrand, starting with our brand essence - that we exist to support young people to realise their potential, which was at the heart of Father Riley’s ethos - right through to our logo, colour palette, graphic devices and organisation statements.
Rebranding often brings significant changes. How does Youth Off The Streets plan to ensure the community continues to relate to the charity despite changes like a new logo or visual identity?
As we were so consultative and collaborative throughout the research and development of every aspect of the refreshed brand, I'm confident the end result will resonate with our audiences.
As we have been saying, 'new look, same vision' and that really is true. Children and young people in need remain at the centre of every decision we make, and the positive difference we can make on their lives with the support of our generous donors and partners is what really matters. That will never change.
What methods have you found most effective in reaching youth who may not actively seek support? Are there specific platforms or comms partnerships that have worked well?
Children and young people are typically referred to Youth Off The Streets by other community services or their mainstream high school, but I believe we’ll have increased appeal to them and create an even greater sense of belonging through our more dynamic branding.
Another focus for us is attracting new donors, partners and community advocates for our work and the issues facing vulnerable young Australians.
For example, according to the latest Census, children and young people aged 12 to 24 now account for a staggering 23 per cent of Australia's total homeless population. That is completely unacceptable. There is a lot of work to be done and through our rebrand, we aim to inspire and encourage as many people as possible to join us in tackling some very challenging, but not unsolvable, social issues.
Are you noticing any significant trends or changes in how NFP organisations are positioning themselves in the current landscape?
We emphasise in our communications and positioning that we walk alongside children and young people, we don’t sit opposite them and tell them what they need to do.
As a youth services organisation, we’re interested in each individual young person’s circumstances, needs, immediate goals and longer-term aspirations - and in every case, these will be unique to them.
This is where the importance of lived experience and co-designed social services and programs comes into play, an approach which is increasingly being centred across the not-for-profit sector.
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