SUCCESS STORY >

AMERICAN MADE BRAND MANAGEMENT

American-Made was not a single campaign or one-off visual identity. It was a growing DOE/NREL innovation platform made up of prizes, partners, entrepreneurs, national labs, support organizations, and regional networks. The brand needed to feel cohesive at the ecosystem level while remaining flexible enough for individual prizes to express their own audiences, technologies, and goals.

CHALLENGE

  • American-Made needed a cohesive brand system that could unify multiple clean energy prizes, partners, entrepreneurs, support organizations, and communications channels‍
  • The program had to speak to several audiences at once, including innovators, startups, prize competitors, DOE leadership, national labs, industry partners, regional organizations, and the broader clean energy ecosystem.
  • Each prize needed its own identity, audience focus, and promotional energy while still feeling connected to the larger American-Made platform.
  • Inconsistent visuals, messaging, and tone risked making the program feel fragmented and harder to understand.
  • The challenge was to create a flexible brand framework that could support growth, partner participation, prize launches, training, outreach, and long-term program recognition.

MY ROLE

  • Served as a long-term brand development partner and brand steward for the American-Made program.
  • Helped evolve, maintain, and govern the brand system as the platform expanded across multiple prizes, partners, vendors, and communication channels.
  • Provided quality control and creative direction to ensure prize materials felt consistent, credible, and connected to the larger American-Made identity.
  • Curated visual approaches, messaging patterns, templates, and design examples to help teams understand how to apply the brand across different contexts.
  • Educated and trained designers, prize leads, vendors, and internal teams on how to use the brand system effectively and consistently.
  • Helped scale the platform by creating guidance, reusable assets, and governance practices that made the brand easier to manage across a growing ecosystem.
  • Balanced consistency and flexibility so individual prizes could express their own technology focus and audience needs while still reinforcing the larger American-Made platform.

SOLUTION

  • Developed and evolved a flexible brand system that could support the American-Made platform as it expanded across multiple prizes, technologies, audiences, and partner organizations.
  • Created a framework that balanced consistency and flexibility, allowing individual prizes to have their own focus and energy while remaining connected to the larger American-Made identity.
  • Established visual and messaging patterns, templates, examples, and guidance to help teams apply the brand consistently across digital, print, presentation, training, event, and outreach materials.
  • Supported brand governance through ongoing creative direction, quality control, review, and refinement of materials created by internal teams, prize leads, vendors, and partner organizations.
  • Curated brand examples and reusable assets that helped designers and non-designers understand what “on brand” looked like in practice.
  • Trained and educated designers, prize leads, and collaborators so the brand could scale across a decentralized ecosystem without losing coherence or credibility.

IMPACT

  • Helped American-Made grow from a set of individual prize communications into a more unified and recognizable national clean energy innovation platform.
  • Strengthened brand consistency across multiple prizes, teams, vendors, partners, and communication channels.
  • Made it easier for designers, prize leads, and collaborators to create materials that felt credible, connected, and aligned with the larger American-Made identity.
  • Helped individual prizes maintain their own audience focus and technology story while reinforcing the broader American-Made brand.
  • Improved the program’s ability to present clean energy innovation as a coordinated ecosystem rather than a collection of disconnected initiatives.

PRIZE IDENTITY & 
COLLABORATION

  • Each American-Made prize has a distinct visual identity, messaging, and audience focus, while aligning with the overarching brand system.
  • Modular framework allows prizes to express unique themes (solar, water, manufacturing) yet remain part of the national innovation ecosystem.
  • HeroX platform supports participant collaboration, stakeholder engagement, and community building.
  • Creates a scalable, connected network where each prize contributes to the larger ecosystem under a unified brand.

"John has a unique ability to see the broader picture and to think strategically; every design decision is backed by a clear understanding of the content, audience, and brand., John is someone you want on your team."
–Joelynn Schroeder, Silver Square Solutions