Gerry Cronin joined Table Tennis England as Head of Marketing & Communications on March 17. She has been involved in playing, volunteering and working in sport, including working for Badminton England for five years in the areas of membership and marketing. Here, she explains the transition to our new brand.

The word “branding” has become a short-hand for “corporate identity”.  It is generally used to describe an organisation’s visual identity.  Think of it in the same way that what you wear says a lot about your personality and the way you want people to view you.

Similarly, our audience will have made a judgment about The English Table Tennis Association purely on the way we presented ourselves visually.  The organisation has adapted, grown and re-focused since we last re-branded, and the new brand will communicate our values, our ethos and what we are as an organisation and will develop a personality of its own.

It tells the audience everything about the company – acronyms can sometimes confuse the outside world.  Think about the ETTA – for those outside the Table Tennis world, would they know what the acronym stood for?  Table Tennis England, to use a common phrase “Does what it says on the tin”.  We are Table Tennis in England.

The elements of a brand:
font + colour + motif = logo and visual identity.

Font was chosen because it is easy to read, authoritative but modern and friendly.

Colours:

  • Red – associated with energy, strength, power and passion, determination, courage and leadership
  • White – new beginning, cool, clean, solid and reliable. And together with red makes the cross of St George
  • Black – as a supporting, or accent colour.  Gives us a solid foundation, strength and authority.

Motif:  We have decided to call this element the “flick” – it shows movement, power and agility.

Table Tennis England officially launched on May 19th, 2014. You will see the old logo gradually phased out, and everything new will be produced with the new logo on. This may take a little time as stocks of items are reduced.

To contact us, the new email addresses will appear in the format [email protected], and our new general email address is [email protected]

For any advice on the new logo, or if you want to get a copy to add to your website, please contact [email protected]. Events are being run as ETTA until the end of the season, but after that, if you see the ETTA logo anywhere, please let us know.

We are Table Tennis England (never shortened to TTE) – we want to tell the world about the sport we love.