Manaaki whenua, manaaki tangata, haere whakamua.
Since moving to New Zealand and starting a new challenge with the NZ Green Building Council, I’ve had the luxury of reflecting on my experience in working with some great brands and great leaders in international brand and marketing.
In the last two weeks, we’ve launched our new brand identity. Another step in the journey. For me, this refresh is one of the most exciting I’ve managed across telcos, financial services, construction and utility companies. I’m enormously proud of what we’re achieving for our members, our industry and our teams. We are going beyond the classics of customer centricity and market positioning, to really push for long term change for Aotearoa.
The refreshed branding has been developed over the past few years as NZGBC has pushed hard into Government and worked with the private sector to drive adoption of sustainability in our homes, buildings and places for a better Aotearoa.
In September 2019, we released the Zero Carbon Roadmap for Aotearoa. An outline of the building and construction industry’s role in reducing New Zealand’s carbon emissions from current levels of 20% of the country’s overall pollution levels. The next move was made by the New Zealand Government in passing the Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Act.
Prior to this, the Government followed the lead of NZGBC’s HomeFit proposition to introduce legislation to improve the Healthy Homes Act and initiatives such as Warm Up Kiwi Homes. And in 2020, we were delighted by the Government’s initiative under Building for Climate Change.
Meanwhile, the NZGBC continues our journey. The old branding had been in place for more than 10 years and while we appreciate so many love it, we need to keep up with the times and reflect the role we play in delivering better places for kiwis today.
Our team recognises that our passion for delivering on healthy homes and buildings for all kiwis cannot be delivered without appreciating Te Tiriti o Waitangi and its principles of partnership, participation, and protection. NZGBC has for some time embraced the perspective of kaitiakitanga in a holistic way - to better connect people to healthy environments.
The time has come to better reflect our vision and focus externally. It’s a delicate balance.
Looking after what’s indoors, helps look after the great New Zealand outdoors, and provide a clean, healthy, and happy legacy for our children, for our mokopuna, for generations to come. A sustainable Aotearoa can only happen working together alongside others to ensure we have future natural resources to draw upon.
Our new logomark to reflect our unique location, ambition and responsibility to protect the mauri of our whenua, built environments and people. For us, the use of the Poutama as central to our brand identity signals our unity and focus in moving forward as well as acknowledging our past. The three interconnected strands show how NZGBC's values link to people, the environment and protecting our natural resources.
They are important as they represent how we value each other, how we value our country and the responsibility we have to protect this through encouraging sustainable building practices.
So the new logo is just another step on our journey. We cannot afford to stand still. Government is outwardly committing to great things but since their election commitments in late 2020, they’re now crabwalking (a little to the left, a little to the right). Ministers are making all the right noises advocating for change across our industry. Our 540 strong members are actively demonstrating they’re ready for change – through building and retrofitting green buildings, homes and communities, improving supply chains, minimising waste and more efficient use of precious water and energy resources.
Our commitment for driving change comes through our members and all our valued partners. We will continue to improve through relationships with our technical experts as they guide us through technical advisory and expert reference panels. The next version of Homestar is working toward the step change we need to decarbonise our homes. And 2021/22 will see further improvements in buildings across the public and private sectors.
We continue our journey. We are richer for our community involvement and our international network of green building councils who strive toward reducing global warming by at least 1.5 degrees by 2030 by which time my children who are currently enjoying the innocence of school holidays will be 25, 23 and 21.