Frequently Asked Questions
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General
Our brand is a macro expression of who we are. When we speak of the UofL core brand, we mean the broad collection of traits and guiding principles that define our identity.
- Long-term, enduring manifestation of who we are
- Broadly applicable across the university, to all audiences
- Inspires all levels of communication and action; what we say and do
Campaign is a micro expression of our brand that serves a specific purpose. We create campaigns to meet strategic and tactical communication goals.
- Shorter-term, focusing on timely goals, trends
- Focused on specific audiences, but can serve as a rallying cry for many
- Focused on outputs: ads, collateral, social media
Messaging
Making an emotional connection with your audience is the key to getting them interested in learning more and taking action. Resources are available to assist you in the creation of branded messaging content.
We conducted market research in 2018 and again in 2020 to help us determine our “why”, who we are and our core values. Then we followed a clear path set forth for us in UofL’s strategic plan and our Cardinal Principles. All that combined led to our brand framework. This foundation was used to inform our guidance on messaging, personality, voice, tone and pillars.
Color
Red and black are what we are known for, so the dominant colors—those most easily seen upon first glance—should always be red and black. That being said, they're bold colors and a little can go a long way. Use common sense and make sure that you're paying attention to legibility in what you're creating.
If you are unsure, you can always ask us. Submit a brand compliance check and we'll get back to you.
Our secondary palette exists as a supporting player in the cast, to help soften the bold spirit of our primary palette. The secondary colors should never be the dominant colors in what you create, as they are not identifiably UofL.
In general, CMYK is a color space used for printing. RGB is a color space for screens. Because our red is pretty fierce in print (publications, merchandise, etc.), that doesn't make for the best viewing experience on back-lit screens (web, presentations, email signatures, etc.)—it can be pretty harsh. We darken the red values in our RGB palette, so please be aware when creating things on-brand. And be sure that you're using the correct version of the logo for your application (CMYK or RGB).
Logos
With a brand as large and complex as ours, you can imagine there are qualifications for eligibility for sub-brand marks. Schools, colleges, board-approved centers/institutes are awarded logos due to their need to compete in the marketplace. We follow a standard model of brand architecture and have restricted who is awarded sub-brands.
Check the qualifications, and if you're still unsure you can contact us to find out if you qualify.
In general, if you work in an office, department, lab, committee, or other administrative unit, your marketing and advertising will use the main UofL logo.
It depends. We love our mascot, but using the correct mark is important.
The Cardinal Bird by itself is our primary athletic logo, and is not appropriate for non-athletic entities to use (this applies to the Gothic L and all athletic marks). The primary signature of the university combines the bird head with our wordmark and may be used without modification by non-athletic units.
The Minerva is very special to us, and (like almost all other universities) we also protect the use of it to preserve that. Read more about how the seal is used.
Older marks (e.g. old versions of the cardinal bird, monogram, etc.) should not be used except for very special projects and only with permission.
UofL faculty, staff and students can access general creative assets in our Brand Center. For school or college logos or for more information, see this resource.
We hope so! We love when people represent UofL. But with any brand as widely-known as ours, there are policies and procedures in place to protect it. Check out our licensing information to learn about what restrictions there are when using our marks.
Fonts
If you're working on a document, presentation, etc. that will only be seen by audiences on campus, yes. However, if you're creating something that is meant to be seen or used by outside audiences (brochures, merchandise, websites, publications), you should use our brand fonts.
The Office of Communications and Marketing is able to get a volume discount for brand fonts. Let us know how many seats (users) you need and we can purchase the typefaces for you at a greatly reduced rate, without additional charge.
The Office of Communications and Marketing has integrated our the brand fonts into the design system used in all Drupal templates at no cost to units.
For your office documents, you are able to use the brand fonts if you have purchased a license. Many of our branded assets and templates offer support for these. However, be advised that depending on the software you are using and the file format you are sharing (e.g. PDF vs .docx), the fonts may not be viewable to collaborators and peers due to license restrictions. Fallback/system fonts would be used for those individuals upon opening the file.
General application of the brand
The Office of Communications & Marketing has marketing liaisons that serve a portion of the university community. For those interested in checking the availability of OCM, start with our creative brief form. Additionally, UofL has two outside agencies that specialize in marketing, advertising, design and web development that are available for hire.
For more information, please contact us.
Our downloads section has a wide selection of pre-made assets and templates to download, for use in both Microsoft and Adobe software. Many items are available to the general public, but publication templates are targeted to UofL faculty, staff and student use.
Make sure that you're up to date on our licensing and merchandise information. If you'd like to begin the process of becoming an CLC-licensed vendor in order to sell your products with a UofL logo on them, check out CLC's website.
Web
UofL is in the final phase of completing our migration to Drupal. All previous sites should have been migrated by a team within your unit. If this is a new request please contact web@louisville.edu.
Visual and experiential consistency are indicators of a healthy brand and ultimately build trust. In 2019, the Office of the President charged OCM with initiating a campus-wide project to achieve this goal. All UofL entities are required to utilize the official CMS (Drupal), hosting (Acquia) and themes. However, the university design system is quite robust, offering many components in a variety of layout configurations.
It isn't appropriate to use a commercial (.com) domain extension for an educational entity who is not-for-profit in status. We're also stronger in numbers. Generally speaking, from a search standpoint you will fare much better (higher search ranking) for your site with it under the louisville.edu domain due to the immensity of our web footprint. Read more about this.
Miscellaneous
UofL's Brand Center is a digital asset management system for storing and organizing university photography for marketing and advertising. All faculty, staff and students have access to a general library of assets. Members of the media can contact us for access to our Media Portal.