Kendal Corp. Refreshes Brand with eye On Future Senior Living growth 

Not-for-profit senior living provider The Kendal Corporation has new branding, but its focus on keeping up with the changing pace of senior living demand hasn’t changed.

The organization changed branding at its 10 affiliated communities from legacy visual standards to a modernized, cohesive identity to reflect strategic, cultural and engagement needs of a changing senior living environment.

Kendal has in the last two years built a more dynamic leadership team with subject matter experts and new utility positions capable of working across disciplines. While Kendal-affiliated communities were seeing the positive tailwinds of strong senior living demand, the system’s branding needed to be updated both visually and symbolically to represent the current senior living environment, according to CEO Vassar Byrd. 

The change was needed to reflect Kendal’s Quaker values alongside the company’s deep history of serving older adults while matching how the company has evolved since its founding in the 1970s, she said. 

The refresh aligned Kendal’s image with ongoing and future growth as a system of affiliated senior living communities that are changing to meet increased demand. At the same time, Kendal invested in staffing to provide more hands-on support for communities.

“It feels like the [Kendal] system is coming together in a way that maybe hasn’t been the case as a whole,” Byrd told Senior Housing News. “We have a great respect for our history, and we’re taking off from our foundational roots and we’re reinventing as a far more dynamic company and we needed something that would show that to people.”

Collaboration was a key theme as part of the strategic rebranding effort involving all 11 Kendal affiliated senior living communities, fielding insights from community department leaders and residents before presenting final options to all affiliates.

The underlying structure and governance of Kendal affiliates has not changed as part of the brand refresh, with all communities maintaining their own boards and local decision making authority, while the Kendal Corporation team focuses on where the system can leverage its scale and strength, including brain health research and IT infrastructure. 

Kendal’s new brand takes the form of a three-petal shape to reflect the groups critical to making the Kendal communities what they are today: residents and members, staff and affiliate boards. The new brand includes a modernized logo set that provides cohesive imagery to all affiliates based on “Kendal green” and a “raspberry accent.”

Messaging across all communities now focuses on creating belonging, vitality and individuality, while matching color palettes and single-line illustrations to show connection, creativity and momentum.

“We’re creating this sort of umbrella, but underneath that, everyone’s got their own thing that makes them unique, united under common principles,” Byrd said.

Adapting to meet current demand

Senior living providers have taken varying approaches in how to best attract older adults to senior living, and with demand for senior living remaining strong, Kendal took the opportunity to bring refreshed brand standards to all its affiliated communities in a changing market.

If a stronger Kendal brand identity helps lead to a new community joining as an affiliate or occupancy gains continue, the intense collaboration for this rebranding effort will have paid off, with the larger goal in mind to serve more older adults, Byrd said.

The refresh aims to create a more dynamic relationship between corporate support and Kendal-affiliated communities, creating a set of standards all communities can use to create a cohesive overall message while not abandoning each community’s unique traits, Byrd said.

“Everyone is working alongside our affiliates as a partner, implementing solutions—we’re not just in a corner giving advice,” Byrd said. “This is rooted in strengthening standalone not-for-profit communities and we’re preserving and strengthening them in a way that is unique.”

Gauging the success in the rebranding effort lies in the overall resident and community engagement and in how many inquiries the Kendal Corporation receives regarding potential future affiliations. Another barometer of success will be the recruitment of new staff.

The new branding will help Kendal “evolve from the foundation,” rather than solving something that was inherently “wrong” with the company’s past history, Byrd said.

Embracing unique differences, focused on single goal

Themes around individuality and personalization were identified in the company’s market research as part of the brand awareness campaign, and feedback routinely mentioned Kendal’s strength of creating “resident-directed life” enrichment and programming.

While each Kendal community is different in scope, each community unites under “sustainability, interest in the environment and social justice,” Byrd said. Kendal relies on resident-directed committees and grassroots community initiatives that span environmental action and protection to social justice initiatives.

“It’s really about supporting the individual person as they express themselves in their individual community, but how rolls up into who we are as Kendal, that’s pretty powerful,” Byrd said. 

The refreshed identity will also help Kendal grow in the future, with Byrd saying that Kendal was “deeply committed” to new growth, including new development, while supporting existing affiliates along the way. Kendal is seeking new affiliations with new communities and ways to improve brain health and cognitive support as older adults age.

“We want to push on every element to see where we can create something new, or more affordable, or appealing to different elders. It’s not a monolith; there are all kinds of people who deserve choices, and we’d like to show up for as many as we can,” Byrd added.

The eye toward new growth comes as nearly all Kendal-affiliated senior living communities are “full with a wait list,” which signals there is room for future growth, Byrd said. The effort also creates a more “powerful” system of affiliated senior living communities, as communities will be able to share data on initiatives like brain health research, as an example.

Focusing on operations

In the last 12 months, Kendal has overhauled its organizational chart, adding a chief information officer to work alongside the company’s chief technology officer to improve staff efficiency and data collection across the organization. The Kendal Corporation also overhauled its dining program to meet the demands of today’s senior living customers.

These efforts mirror the brand evolution; standardizing platforms like financial reporting and clinical systems is intended to free up local leaders to focus on the resident experience and local market strategy.

The company also implemented a new financial reporting platform, with plans underway to overhaul medical billing in the future. The organization recently incorporated a separate not-for-profit entity, Kendal Charitable Funds, under its not-for-profit status. That will allow for future initiatives around data sharing and research, Byrd said.

Over half of the Kendal-affiliated communities are planning expansions or redevelopment projects because of waiting lists. Byrd said the industry faces a big challenge in creating the right kind of senior living options that older adults will seek out, spanning affordable models to intergenerational and co-operative senior living. 

“I am very excited about thinking about how people want to live as we move forward,” Byrd said. “I think Kendal will be pushing to try to figure out how to make that work.”

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