A collage featuring the logo and branding materials of Ship Smart, established in 1999, including a website screenshot advertising affordable shipping estimates, a white hoodie with the Ship Smart logo, business cards with the logo, and a font sty

Brand Identity & OS Overhaul

Cohesive Brand System that Powers Every Product

Overview

For 25 years, Ship Smart operated under an outdated brand with fragmented messaging and a lack of documented understanding of its customers and their decision-making processes. The company had never invested in user research or established a consistent design system, which resulted in a digital experience that failed to effectively communicate its value, build trust, and scale.

I led the first comprehensive Brand Identity & OS Overhaul in the company's history, creating a research-driven framework that unifies the business from the inside out. The result is a new brand foundation that enhances every product, webpage, and customer interaction, transforming the Ship Smart brand into a modern, trustworthy small-move specialist.

KPI’s & Improvements

  • ↑ 41% YoY increase in chat-initiated bookings

  • ↑ 38% YoY increase in chat-based sales

  • ↑ 173% increase in live-chat engagement

  • ↑ 31% increase in click-through rates

  • ↑ 62% increase in mobile sessions

Role: Lead UX & Product Designer

Responsibilities: Research, UX Strategy, Information Architecture, Visual Design, Systems Thinking, Cross-Functional Alignment, Design System Development

Timeline: 18 Months

Tools: Figma, Google Analytics, Chat Transcript Analysis, Competitive Research, User Interviews

Final Design

My Process

Design Question

How could Ship Smart transform an outdated, inconsistent brand into a clear, trustworthy system that reflects the quality of service it actually delivers?

Close-up of a pair of silver scissors cutting a yellow ribbon.

Research & Discovery

I conducted Ship Smart’s first comprehensive research initiative to understand their customers, market, and brand gaps.

Collection of screenshots from the Ship Smart website, a company providing custom packing and shipping solutions, showing contact info, service highlights, customer estimates, and online quote options.

Methods

  • Analyzed extensive customer communication data across calls and chats

  • Conducted user and stakeholder interviews

  • Followed multiple customers through complete end-to-end journeys

  • Audited existing branding and website experience

  • Performed competitive analysis and market analysis

  • Mapped customer journeys and service workflows

  • Reviewed marketing materials, sales scripts, and support logs

Customer Understanding

Diagram illustrating different types of movers categorized into four groups on the right side, with a circle representing individuals on the left and a smaller circle for referral partners overlapping the individuals circle.

By focusing on user characteristics instead of lead sources, I identified nine key customer segments. An analysis of audience engagement revealed a critical gap: digital-first users, particularly Millennials and Gen Z, were underrepresented. This disconnect between the brand's positioning and modern customer expectations has directly influenced the rebranding efforts.

Market Alignment

Collage of various moving and storage company branding and websites, including United Van Lines, Bellhop, and Clutter, with images of trucks, movers, and storage spaces.

Through competitive analysis, survey insights, and firsthand experience with the most digital-first moving services, I examined how other brands successfully engage Millennial and Gen Z customers. These findings highlighted precisely where Ship Smart needed to modernize its approach.

Brand Foundation

I grounded the project in Ship Smart's 25-year history as a family-owned business, emphasizing its strong relationships with employees and vendors. This established the company’s identity and differentiation in the small-move market, serving as the foundation for the brand operating system. From this work, I defined the core brand framework, specifically the Mission Statement, Selling Position, and Brand Pillars.

Mission Statement

We provide the highest-quality customer service in the industry at competitive prices, delivering the best shipping and small-move experience.

Selling Position

We specialize in small moves, offering expert packing and dependable service that make high-quality shipping easy, affordable, and stress-free.

Brand Pillars

Small-Move Expertise, Trusted & Dependable, Decades of Experience, Comprehensive Packing

Brand Voice

A table comparing business needs, emotional drivers, and customer needs, including items such as audience clarity, trust, transparency, and reliable service.

I analyzed the business and its customers’ needs, uncovering shared emotional expectations that defined the brand’s personality. I then crafted a consistent voice that reflects these qualities in every interaction.

Trusted. Supportive. Affordable. Easy. Reachable.

Brand Tone

A chart showing four traits with corresponding scales from serious to funny, irreverent to respectful, disengaged to enthusiastic, and casual to formal.

By understanding the brand and its customers, I developed a tone that reflects the brand’s essence, while ensuring empathy in every interaction and aligning with the brand's values to support its customers.

Professional, Friendly, Helpful, Reassuring

Brand Style

A central logo with a stylized S in red and blue, surrounded by nine other abstract logos in outline style, arranged in a 3x3 grid on a black background.

To bridge Ship Smart’s long-standing heritage with the needs of modern customers, I created a style that reflects the company’s reliability while delivering the clarity and ease digital-first users expect.

Clean, Simple, Retro-Modern

Final Design

A collage featuring the logo and branding materials of Ship Smart, established in 1999, including a website screenshot advertising affordable shipping estimates, a white hoodie with the Ship Smart logo, business cards with the logo, and a font sty
A grayscale portrait of a smiling man with glasses and a beard, wearing a T-shirt, with the company logo and name 'Ship Smart' at the bottom left. The logo features a stylized 'S' with red and blue sections, and the text 'Est. 1999' underneath.
The logo of the American Petroleum Institute, featuring a stylized oil drop in red, white, and blue alongside black text.
onsite Logo with a stylized S in red and blue, with black text that reads 'DM Serif Display', 'ShipSmart', and 'Est. 1999'. Additional text 'DM Sans Light' at the bottom.
Logo for ShipSmart with red and blue graphic of a ship's bow, black and white text, and "Est. 1999".
Guidelines for logo design and color use. The image includes three sections: the first shows a logo with orange and black colors, advising not to change the color and to use the colors in the palette; the second shows a logo with red, blue, and black colors, advising not to change the proportions; the third shows a logo with red, blue, and black on a gray background, advising not to redraw or create a variation of the logo.
A color palette with six color swatches and their hex codes, RGB, and CMYK values. From top left to bottom right: dark blue, red, light gray, white, black.
Collection of blue and white household furniture and items including a recliner, sofa, garden tools, desk, lamp, mattress, grandfather clock, bed, chest, office chair, baby crib, laptop, and decorative objects.
Screenshots of a shipping company's website featuring home, about us, contact, and blog pages. The pages include images of people packing or moving, information about shipping services, customer reviews, and a call-to-action button for estimates.

Business Results

By understanding the brand and its customers, I developed a tone that reflects the brand’s essence, while ensuring empathy in every interaction and aligning with the brand's values to support its customers.

KPI’s & Improvements

  • ↑ 41% YoY increase in chat-initiated bookings

  • ↑ 38% YoY increase in chat-based sales

  • ↑ 173% increase in live-chat engagement

  • ↑ 31% increase in click-through rates

  • ↑ 62% increase in mobile sessions

What I Learned

This project reshaped my understanding of brand systems as the foundation of product design. I learned that without a clear customer definition and unified communication, even the best products struggle to succeed. Creating the Brand OS showed how alignment across teams leads to clearer experiences, faster development, and stronger customer trust.

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