Cook County Visitor’s Bureau Branding

Creating a strong destination brand for Cook County, Minnesota, was one of our greatest challenges and most fun opportunities. This new destination tourism bureau brought together four formerly competing tourism areas in Minnesota’s Northern most county. After extensive market research, customer research, Marketing that Matters developed and consumer tested two finalist brands. The winner: Cook County, Minnesota: Way North of Ordinary.

Cook County is the essence of what a vacation is meant to be: an escape from the ordinary. A much needed break from the everyday and the other 50 weeks in the year. This is the only place where you can enjoy Lake Superior — the world’s largest freshwater lake, visit Minnesota’s tallest mountain peaks and highest waterfall, enjoy its longest and most scenic biking trails, and explore more access points to the spectacular Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. When creating this brand, we were careful to balance the needs and equity in each of the four individual communities. The identity had to pack a lot of punch, differentiating Cook County in big, bold way. The compass logo/mark clearly identifies the place.