Catholic Health Services A brand to support and connect families throughout the hospice journey

Starmark just completed the brand refresh for the L’Chaim Hospice program, and the brand is prepared to launch as an independent business unit. The client is thrilled with the new brand direction, and based upon pre-market testing with real users and expert stakeholders, we expect big results.

The Challenge

The L’Chaim Hospice team approached Starmark to help refresh its unknown brand to better serve the Jewish community in South Florida. L’Chaim Hospice is a specialized team of rabbis and staff who offer palliative care, spiritual support, community and connection to patients with terminal illnesses and their families. It’s an essential part of the Jewish community of South Florida, but a legacy brand position, logo and tagline didn’t accurately reflect the reality or importance of L’Chaim’s mission.

The Starmark team roadmapped a comprehensive rebrand program. Starting with stakeholder interviews and a North Star branding exercise, Starmark helped the L’Chaim team define their core brand experience in simple terms. This allowed us to articulate the brand experience that truly reflected the relationship between L’Chaim, its patients and their families.

A mark to embody the spirit of the brand

L’Chaim is a traditional Hebrew toast — a reminder to celebrate and appreciate life. To capture that sentiment, as well as the personality and identity from the North Star exercise, Starmark established a tone and voice for the brand to inspire logo design exploration. Many logo variations were compared side by side. After multiple rounds of testing with L’Chaim’s audiences, the winning mark was selected.

Meaning and context

The Starmark team developed a slate of tagline options that helped add context and meaning to the brand mark. Based on insights from the stakeholder interviews and user testing, it was clear which elements of the position would need reinforcement in words. We tested top tagline options alongside the logo for preference and comprehension. We determined that a version containing the service category, as well as a reinforcement of the religious focus performed best.

Developing flexible, helpful guidelines

With the approved design, Starmark developed a straightforward guidelines document to create brand consistency in all communications. It explains the brand philosophy, desired experience and how to use the elements successfully across different media. The guide now helps both new and current L’Chaim team members stay aligned in their communications and branding approaches.

New branded web experience

The Starmark team created a personalized user experience for L’Chaim’s Jewish community in South Florida. Using stakeholder interview insights and user testing, the team created a dramatically simpler information architecture and navigation structure. The goal is to live the mission of compassion by helping patients and family members find information more quickly and intuitively. Photos and written content were revised to match the direction of the brand’s personality and identity.

Next up, an integrated marketing campaign

With a well designed brand approach, L’Chaim is ready for the marketplace. Starmark and the client team are preparing to roadmap the go-to-market strategy and integrated campaign approach for L’Chaim. We’ve already started the ideation process to help provide a cohesive brand experience from first contact with a patient’s family, the journey through a helpful website and the ways we surround and substantiate the L’Chaim brand promise for families throughout the hospice end-of-life journey.