Hoping to create a message that resonates with South Florida sports fans, the Panthers have hired SME to develop a brand strategy that encompasses the team and its mission as a source of entertainment.

SME, a premier branding company that has developed brand messages for dozens of teams, sports organizations and companies, has been interviewing season ticket holders and casual fans, current and former players, and former Panthers general manager and president Bill Torrey to learn what the team means to the community.

“Now is the time to go out and do our research to get a good sense of how people feel about us and blend it with how we feel about ourselves,” Panthers Chief Operating Officer Michael Yormark said. “We felt that at this time it was important for us to first do some research in the marketplace, talk to our core hockey fans, sports fans and find out what people think about the Florida Panthers. What do they think about the brand and perhaps reposition ourselves and make sure we’re connecting with both our core audience as well as potentially new fans to get a better understanding of what people think about it, about us, about who we should be.”

SME, which created the Panthers’ logo, developed the NHL’s post-lockout theme and new shield logo. It has worked with dozens of teams, including the Boston Bruins, for whom it created “the Hub of Hockey” campaign, and the Detroit Pistons. The company also designed the striped dolphin logo -- that is vastly different from the team’s cartoonish dolphin logo -- for Dolphin Stadium last year.

Using its “Brand-ON” concept, SME will develop a strategy for the team. The company's Web site, describes "Brand-ON" this way: SME Brand-ON empowers organizations by conveying a profound understanding of the building blocks of their brands. This awareness enables them to successfully communicate essential brand benefits to all constituents through times of prosperity, decline and crisis. Brand-ON uncovers values, promise, positioning and dimensions; leading to powerful conclusive brand strategies, mapping out the successful course of a brand for years to come.

SME expects to develop a message the Panthers will use across their business in advertising, on television, and in BankAtlantic Center.

“Everything we do will revolve around this new creative,” Yormark said.

The idea, says Ed O’Hara, SME chief creative officer and senior partner, is “to better define the Florida Panthers’ brand, to sustain growth, success, clarity of message.”

O’Hara said 60 people have been interviewed, including season ticket holders, booster club members and even fans in sports bars, to find out how they feel about the team. Unlike a survey or focus group, those interviewed do not represent a cross-section of the community, but instead people who already have some affinity for the team.

“We were speaking to the already converted so we heard a lot of good things. They say [of the arena] ‘this is my sanctuary, it’s full of fun and love’,” O’Hara said. “We ask them 'if the Panthers went away tomorrow, how would you feel, what would you do?' We got responses that were everything from ‘You see that window -- I’d jump,’ to ‘I’d have to root for the Tampa Bay Lightning’.”

SME is sharing those findings with team officials during a workshop today. Yormark said he hopes the new brand message will be in place in time for next season.