Standardization News

For more than 125 years, ASTM International has been at the forefront of developing standards and services that enhance industry performance and build consumer confidence. Be it steel or construction, additive manufacturing or commercial spaceflight, ASTM standards underpin the safety and performance of more than 90 industry sectors. Thanks to the tireless work of our 35,000 global members, our partners, and our staff, ASTM has become known as a leading standards-development organization (SDO) with a strong reputation and brand.

Throughout our history, our brand has evolved several times – more recently with the “Standards Worldwide” tagline and later “Helping Our World Work Better” language, along with the use of the colorful boxes you’ve seen in our printed and digital promotional material. In 2023, nearly 10 years after our last brand evolution, a cross-departmental team of staff endeavored to study the effectiveness of our brand and identify whether areas could be improved upon and refreshed. Over nearly a year, the team, with the support of And Then Associates, took part in surveys, in-person and virtual workshops, and engaged focus groups involving members and partner organizations in order to come to several conclusions.

The first was that our ASTM brand is strong. People in the standards world know who we are and what we do. Our members felt positively about “Helping Our World Work Better” and didn’t want to see us depart from that language, if possible. They thought it was reflective of the broad work of our organization internationally, aligned with our mission, and authentic to how we think about our purpose and societal impact.

The second conclusion was that, despite attempts to showcase our international efforts and the true nature of our international status, many people incorrectly perceived “ASTM” as only an American SDO. They would look at our founding and legal name the “American Society of Testing and Materials” and infer that our standards were not fit to be used globally. This would happen in conversations with national standards bodies, international organizations, and in media inquiries and stories written about us. Despite the wonderful work of our members and staff to support global engagement and cooperation in our open standards development process, this misperception seemed to pop up with enough frequency to act as headwind at times.

The final conclusion of the group was that there was room to strengthen and refine ASTM’s visual brand identity. The most recent brand evolution occurred in 2014, when much of our communications were done in print. In the years since, we’ve become a much more digitally-led organization, and any further enhancements should be reflective of that shift.

The efforts of the full team, and the information gleaned from these core conclusions, helped influence the next phase of the project. Working with And Then Associates, we addressed aspects 
of each of the conclusions.

First, we agreed that retaining “Helping Our World Work Better” as our brand purpose was essential. Not only does it build on the brand work from 2014, creating consistency of messaging, it’s also particularly reflective of mission. Our brand purpose encapsulates the reason we exist and serves as a challenge we set for ourselves as we meet the changing needs of society around the world.

Second, we wanted to take ownership of the ASTM acronym in a way that appropriately and accurately articulates what the letters A-S-T-M mean for the organization and its members today. We came up with “Advancing Standards. Transforming Markets.” This became our brand promise statement that captures the essence of what we do and the impact we have. We believe that through the advancement of standards into any industry, we’re playing a part in transforming the respective markets of that industry. And while our legal name isn’t changing, tying the brand promise to the A-S-T-M acronym gives new meaning to our name beyond the historic reference to the American Society for Testing and Materials.

Next, we addressed the visual side of our brand. To better reflect the more digitally-led communications, we sharpened, brightened, and simplified the brand identity so that it works on screen. To do this, we began with simplification of our colors. Our previous branding used more than 30 colors with various iterations of shading on each. But here, we’ve created a primary ASTM electric blue color that pops in print and on-screen when used digitally. The “ASTM Blue” as we’re calling it is our anchor color. It’s what you’ll see used more than anything else to create greater brand awareness. We paired this with a very slight change of font that works well across print and digital applications.

We brought it all together in a few ways. First, we paired the “Advancing Standards. Transforming Markets” brand promise with our logo. In many of our publications, including this magazine, you’ll see these used together with frequency. This is intentional. We want to emphasize the brand promise and reinforce the narrative that we’re a global organization. Additionally, we’ve created ways to use both the brand promise and the brand purpose together, with “Helping Our World Work Better” operating as a tagline on various publications, ensuring the statement is still prominently displayed as much as possible.

We started rolling out the updated fonts, colors, and logos midway through 2024 on social media with a gradual expansion into posters, flyers, and other designed material as the year progressed. This issue of Standardization News is the first to use the updated brand and moving forward, everything we create will reflect the new branding. We’ll work to replace legacy material as we move forward.

We all know that ASTM is an important organization with significant global reach and relevance. We are confident that these enhancements to our already robust branding will strengthen brand awareness and highlight the impactful work of our members, partners, and staff, and allow us to tell more compelling stories for years to come.●

Dan Bergels is ASTM's director of communications.