Being relevant, recognisable, and focused are values behind an initiative to rebrand the Ignite Wānaka Chamber of Commerce to the Wānaka Business Chamber (WBC).

The rebrand was announced at a gathering of chamber members at the Stoker Room on Wednesday (July 26) night, where WBC chair Jo Learmonth said the Ignite Wānaka brand had served its purpose and it was time to simplify and make the brand more relevant.

“Sometimes people coming into Wānaka, when you said Ignite Wānaka had no idea what Ignite Wānaka was,” Jo said.

“When we did a survey on our members, and we asked them what Ignite meant we got lots of words around the word Ignite, but not actually a lot of words around what we were doing for the business community and that didn't sit very well with us.”

Jo said the Ignite brand was born in 2014 as part of a competition to become New Zealand’s Gigatown and the WBC board felt that it wasn’t as relevant now.

“So we're now known as the Wānaka Business Chamber, which fits with a lot of the rebranding of Chambers of Commerce across New Zealand,” she said. 

“We think it's just more succinct.” 

The name change is accompanied by a new logo which WBC general manager Glenn Peat said they wanted to identify with Wānaka as a sacred place of learning.

The new Wānaka Business Chamber logo.

Glenn said three motifs reflect the pursuit of knowledge, leadership, and a sense of place, brought together in a weave design.

“Hopefully everybody does like the logo and what we're trying to achieve,” he said.

The Wānaka Business Chamber is a membership organisation governed by an elected volunteer board and affiliated with the New Zealand Chamber Network.

Its purpose is to empower the Wānaka business community through collaboration, inspiration, advocacy and recognition.

To find out more about the Wānaka Business Chamber click here.