Brands, Partners and Initiatives

Supporting brands operate through a connection to the university and benefit from this relationship. These entities would not exist without the university, but typically have separate funding and administration. A unique visual identity may exist, but if a UB trademark is leveraged, clear space must be observed between the marks. Leveraging a UB Trademark affirms the relationship between the entities, and in most applications, the UB mark should take visual priority.

The connection between UB and affiliated brands typically emerge from our academic enterprise and/or research pursuits. These brands have their own mission and function that are largely separate from the university, despite a formal collaboration or shared interest in the mission of the organizations. Though not required, affiliated brands may leverage a unit lockup or the university’s master brand mark to establish its relationship with UB while maintaining co-branded clear space. Successful integration should always adhere to brand identity standards and recognize the organization according to any specific guidelines and agreements that are in place.

These endeavors are created by an official university unit and primarily serve internal members of the UB community for a defined period of time while impacting a limited number of people. These may include non-academic programs, events, community outreach services or campaigns. Such initiatives are required to leverage either the master brand lockup (particularly in promotional items) or unit lockup and can also include a wordmark or graphic to represent the initiative. Those supplementary graphics and wordmarks must leverage branded colors. However, master brand or lockup clear space must be observed between the wordmark and UB trademark. A unit cannot modify the master brand lockup, interlocking UB or another UB trademark in conjunction with any other mark or wordmark.

Colleges, schools, departments, centers, institutes and academic programs recieve a brand extension or sub-brand lockup. Buildings, venues and publications do not receive any special visual treatment.

Larger-scale laboratories may recieve a lockup if they are externally facing and regularly recruit study participants for long-running research projects. Additionally, the lab must be permanent and not disappear if a faculty member leaves, and have a unique identity and/or existing reputation that is separate from the department in which it operates from.  Please discuss further with your senior communicator before submitting a request.

A sponsorship is a formal contractual agreement between the university and a third party, where money, services or material compensation is provided in exchange for some sort of relationship with UB. Sponsors do not inherently have a right to use UB trademarks, nor is UB entitled to leverage sponsor marks unless these trademark usages are explicitly and specifically outlined within the fully executed contract. Please refer to each contract for complete usage details and sponsorship benefits.

Review more information on the Sponsorship and Advertising Policy provided by the Office of Corporate and Foundation Relations.

Special collections are considered intellectual property (IP) that belongs to entities or institutions outside of UB. These usually have an established aesthetic, visual identity, insignia, iconography or related “brand” considerations that are wholly separate from the university, yet might function within UB’s physical spaces and/or are supported by UB’s scholarly activities. In these circumstances, and in consultation with the related unit senior communicator and University Communications, it may be appropriate for special collections to have a separate visual identity and would not receive a lockup.