Launched in 2014, the “My Beverly Hills” shop local program aims to encourage public engagement between local businesses and incentivize residents and visitors to increase the amount of money spent within the city. Through a partnership with the city of Beverly Hills and the Beverly Hills Chamber of Commerce, the “My Beverly Hills” lifestyle website and programs promote local dining and shopping, hold monthly events, offer exclu sive promotions, and highlight businesses impacted by Metro construction.
As part of the Chamber’s Work Plan contract with the city, the shop local program will be rebranded from the existing “My Beverly Hills” branding to “Now Beverly Hills.” At its Aug. 31 Chamber of Commerce Committee Liaison meeting, City Council Liaisons Mayor Robert Wunderlich and Vice Mayor Lili Bosse provided feedback and approved a rebrand design concept presented by Symblaze, a full-service digital agency contracted for the task. Reinvented as Now Beverly Hills, the new design features the word “Now” inside the city’s iconic shield, with Beverly Hills appearing underneath the shield, in orange, pink, and turquoise color variants.
The new logo will be used for new street pole banner designs, social media assets, website branding and more. Having garnered support and suggestions from council liaisons, Symblaze will develop additional campaign designs to present for final approval from the City Council at its Sept. 14 Study Session. With funding already incorporated into the city’s contract with the Chamber, the launch of the rebranded Shop Local program is expected to proceed in October 2021.
“For Beverly Hills, that shield shape is very powerful,” Josh Morgerman, co-founder of Symblaze, said. “People all over the LA Metro area and beyond, they know that shield as a Beverly Hills thing.”
Last year, the program encouraged people to patronize local restaurants by running an outdoor dining campaign, featuring businesses that were participating in the City’s OpenBH program. During the 2020 holiday season, the “My Beverly Hills” program launched a “Shop Local, Get Local” campaign where locals who shopped at retailers in the city could use their receipts to be entered into weekly contests, raffling gift cards to local restaurants. The shop local program is complimentary to partake in, with over 4,000 email subscribers and steady attendance at mixers.
“I think Beverly Hills now can speak to a resident and encourage me, as a resident, to shop and dine in the Beverly Hills of the now, what is currently here,” Vice Mayor Lili Bosse said. “I feel that it also makes people who don’t live in our city, who were coming to visit either as tourists or if they live in West Hollywood or Westwood, they know what we have now.”
“I was thinking that the symbolism of it would be that it’s uniting something different and preserving something that’s the same,” Mayor Robert Wunderlich said of incorporating the Beverly Hills shield into the rebranding.
“It’s the recognizable iconic figure,” Bosse said. “Everybody knows that’s our shield, but you know what, this is us now.”
To learn more about the shop local program, visit http://www.mybeverlyhills.net/.
