Sound Off is a public forum. Articles are selected from letters to the editor or may be written specifically for this feature. Today, Port Orchard resident Bruce Stigler takes issues with the mayor’s involvement in the city’s efforts to develop a “name brand.”

Lary Coppola should stick with his duties as mayor — working to make Port Orchard the kind of city people can connect with.

If the city wants to create a positive brand that the community can connect with, having one of the mayor’s employees create a color logo is starting the process out on the wrong foot.

As a branding and design professional, I was concerned after reading the story in the Oct. 4 issue of the Port Orchard Independent. A good identity can be a key part of building a brand, but it is not the first step.

Research, analysis, mapping a strategy and creating a plan for the city’s brand nets you more then a color logo and a clever tagline.

Hire a consultant, work through the process; build a strategy and direction for the brand — then hire someone to create an identity and develop a complete look and feel for the brand.

Tinkering with a brand is like playing with dynamite, in the wrong hands, it can do more damage than good.

After all, “Just Say Wa!” was created by professional — and look where it ended up.

Actually, he won’t

Sound Off is a public forum. Articles are selected from letters to the editor or may be written specifically for this feature. Today, Port Orchard Chamber of Commerce director Coreen Haydock-Johnson asnwers the above letter.

The mayor is not creating a brand for the city. A selected task force of community business persons and leaders is working on identifying what connects individuals (residents and non residents) to the community of Port Orchard, what touches people’s hearts, what kind of experience we can promise when you come to visit or to live here.

From that, we will hopefully identify a brand and a strategy for its adoption. We are all collaborating and I am the lead, not the mayor.

We are working from a branding book for small communities written by a professional in the field and we have arranged a consultant to meet with us as well.

We are doing the best we can, right now with analysis and assessment as an important first step. We are in no position financially to hire a consultant to do all the work for us.

I am well aware of the pitfalls of this process as well as the steps that should be taken. Please wish us luck.