International, grassroots partnership seeks inspiring logo

Groundswell International

Groundswell International is an emerging nonprofit being set up by a group of people from Africa, Asia, Latin America and the US with many years of experience in people-centered, rural community development. Mission: Groundswell International, a part of the global movement creating a positive future for people and the planet, supports community-based organizations to work together to improve their lives, spread success, and have a voice in the decisions that effect them. Areas of work: We support sustainable agriculture, strengthening of local food systems, community health, women’s equity, and environmental and spiritual wellbeing.

We are targeting people who care about building a more hopeful, just, equitable, sustainable future for all, including the 1 billion poorest people who live in rural villages in the developing world. Our audience will be people who believe in the power of people to bring change. These will be people of all ages, races, religious and political persuasions – but who want to be involved in positive social change. They will care about issues like overcoming poverty in Africa, Asia and Latin America, sustainable agriculture and strengthening local food systems, a healthy environment, community empowerment, women’s equity. We hope our logo will communicate what we are about to individual donors, foundations and to other nonprofits.

1. Logo must be original: please do not use stock images and absolutely no clip art in the logo.
2. Clean but not too “corporate.” Not too “folksy.” Groundswell is a grassroots organization, but its partners are very capable and professional.
3. Simple and not cluttered.
4. We would like the logo to have a feeling that it is about human beings and nature/agriculture.
5. To us the word Groundswell means a social movement and welling up of public opinion and actions of people around the world to create a better future.
6. Other ideas and images we would be interested in capturing: A sense of a social movement of people; people moving and acting together to bring change, in a positive and constructive rather than an angry way; images of rural people from villages in Africa, Latin America and Africa; agriculture and growing food; people who are very connected to nature; a sense of rising up from the ground; perhaps a seed or related images.
7. We are open regarding the typeface, but it should not be childish, too bubbly or too corporate. We may add a tagline later so ideally it would be a typeface that we could use for a tagline.
8. Earthy colors -- blues, browns, and greens. Use bright reds, oranges and similar colors sparingly if at all.
9. The word “Groundswell” should be prominent. The word “International” should be visible in a smaller typeface and not as emphasized.