A rebrand isn't just a new logo. It's a reflection of who you are, what you stand for, and how you want to show up for the people you serve. When we set out to reimagine the Co-op's visual identity for the first time in years, we knew we needed a team that didn't just understand design, they needed to understand us.

We found that team right here in Bozeman. Sitekick is a local design and development agency who grew up shopping at this store, whose families have been members for years, and who understood the weight of the work before the first meeting even started. Over the course of many months, they became less like an outside vendor and more like an extension of our own team.

Meet the Team

Joel - CEO & Software Engineer

Joel grew up in Alaska and moved to Bozeman in 2008 to study film at MSU. After years in commercial videography and software entrepreneurship, including founding the event ticketing platform Sellout, he co-founded Sitekick in 2024 with a clear mission: bring the quality of high-tech product design to local businesses. On this project, Joel built the custom CMS in Framer, overhauled the daily menu and weekly deals systems, and finally got soups displaying on the website, something members had been asking about for years!

Waylon - UX / Product Lead

Waylon grew up in Whitefish and moved to Bozeman in 2013 to study computer science at MSU, where he led the Launchpad's student venture coaching and design teams. After years leading product teams across design and engineering, he co-founded Sitekick with Joel. At the agency, Waylon leads the design process with a focus on keeping it efficient and transparent, he wants every client to feel like they're gaining a team genuinely invested in what they're building, not just hiring an outside firm.

Alexa - Brand, UI & Web Designer

Though Alexa grew up in Germany, Bozeman has always been home, her mom is from here, her grandmother still lives here, and her mom even worked at the Co-op during her college years! She came to Montana for high school, fell in love with Bozeman, and stayed to study graphic design at MSU. After launching her career at A&E Design, she became a partner at Sitekick, where she leads visual storytelling through illustration, typography, layout, and web design. On this project, Alexa led the sub-brand system, packaging, and labeling work.

Isaac - Brand Designer & Strategist

Born and raised in Bozeman, Isaac comes from a family of lifelong Co-op members. After earning his BA in Design from Western Washington University, he worked at Studio Number One in Los Angeles, where mission-driven design shaped his entire philosophy. As a partner and lead designer at Sitekick, he brought that same ethos here. On this project, Isaac led the typographic voice of the brand, spending hours finding typefaces that could honor the Co-op's roots while feeling fresh for this next chapter.

Getting to Know Sitekick

Before a single concept was sketched, the Sitekick team did something that set the tone for the entire project: they just showed up. They walked the stores, took photos, talked to staff, and tried to understand the Co-op not as designers looking in, but as community members who had been part of it their whole lives. Strategy came before visuals, and immersion came before strategy.

What they found was a place deeply loved, but one whose brand hadn't kept pace with that love. For longtime members, everything made sense. For newcomers, the visual language could feel scattered and hard to read. There was a lot of warmth inside the walls of the Co-op, and not quite enough of it making it to the outside.

We were struck by how passionate the team was. Everyone we met who kick-started this project was incredibly dedicated to doing a good job and always had their members and each other in mind. We could really tell how much the Co-op cares, and that drew us to the project. - Joel

The Creative Process

Once the strategy work was done, the visual exploration began. Mood boarding, color, type, photography, the building blocks of a brand came together slowly and deliberately. The logo process alone lasted two to three months, and for good reason. Twenty to thirty concepts were explored in the initial phase, each one tied back to the Co-op's mission of community and connection.

The direction that resonated most told a story of people gathering around a fire to cook together. That idea evolved into the concept of a soup pot as a melting pot of departments, ingredients, and people. Once the story clicked, the team spent nearly as long refining the visual as they had concepting it.

One of my passions in brand design is typography. I spent hours researching typefaces that could honor the Co-op's rooted values while still feeling fresh and forward for this next chapter in Bozeman's community. - Isaac

From there, the brand expanded outward. Alexa led the sub-brand system, which opened up a whole new layer of creative possibilities. "The sub-brands were really fun for me," she says. "Seeing how the system could apply across different touchpoints, and watching it expand into labeling and packaging, those were the highlights of this project." Meanwhile, Waylon was deep in the complexity of the Co-op's operations, workshopping requirements with the team and finding design solutions in real time.

The Co-op is a much more intricate business than I expected walking in, and I loved that. The work felt like a puzzle we were solving together. Oh, and shoutout to the Co-op team, our weekly syncs were a highlight of my 2025. -Waylon

A Website that Works for Everyone

Behind the new look, the website got a complete rethink from the inside out, rebuilt to be fast, intuitive, and easy for the Co-op staff to manage on their own. The old system made routine updates a chore, so the team rebuilt it to be fast, intuitive, and easy for the Co-op staff to manage on their own.

My favorite part was building the custom CMS in Framer, along with all the bells and whistles that came with it. We upgraded the system that powers the daily menus on the website and the large TVs above the deli and cafe and gave the weekly deals feed a major overhaul. Building custom solutions that go the extra mile and make life easier for the team is exactly the kind of work I love. - Joel

The team also overhauled the Co-op's price tag and product label system, a detail that might seem small but touches nearly every interaction a member has on the floor. A brand is only as good as a team's ability to use it, and Sitekick thought carefully about what it would look like to hand this off and walk away.

A Note to the Sitekick Team

We are so grateful to Alexa, Isaac, Joel, and Waylon for the care, creativity, and commitment they poured into this work. If you see them around town, or around the store, please give them a warm Co-op welcome. This new chapter wouldn't look the way it does without them.