Brand and media

A pathway company should look like the work it does.

Aotea Kai is practical, regional, commercially serious, and careful with public claims. Our identity follows the same rule: useful before decorative, grounded before glossy, and clear enough for people outside the room to understand.

Public name

Aotea Kai Partners

Use the full name on first mention. Use Aotea Kai after that where the context is clear.

Positioning line

Producer-first. Market-smart. Value kept close.

This line is a company posture, not a seasonal campaign. It should sit beside practical evidence of how the pathway works.

Public description

Aotea Kai Partners is an Aotearoa food and wellbeing pathway company helping regional producers reach better-fit markets through partnership, market translation, logistics coordination, quality proof, commercial discipline, and reinvestment.

Identity system

The brand now has to work wherever the route shows up.

Reports, route cards, producer folders, media packs, cold-chain notes, partner briefings, and recruitment material should all feel like one company: practical, serious, warm, and specific to the work.

Logo system

The mark is a route and return system.

The circular pathway mark represents movement with restraint: producer to market, market back to producer, relationship carried both ways, and value returning through the network. It is the mark we use when we need the company to feel practical, trusted, and recognisable at a glance.

Primary

Use on light backgrounds, public documents, report covers, and partner-facing material.

Transparent

Use when the page or document already provides the light background field.

Reverse

Use on dark green, route navy, or image overlays where contrast is clear.

Stacked

Use for tight placements, report back covers, partner folders, and square-format layouts.

Mark

Use as favicon, social avatar, report spine, small stamp, or app-style symbol.

One-colour

Use the one-colour or reverse mark for embossing, small stamps, dark fields, and production uses where detail must stay clear.

Colour and tone

The palette has to carry field work, evidence, and public trust.

Working green anchors the company. Route navy carries proof and systems. Return gold marks movement and value return. Clay keeps working texture visible. Mist and paper keep reports, maps, and documents warm without turning the identity into a lifestyle palette.

Ink#17201dText

Deep green#17362fCorporate

Working green#245044Pathway

Route navy#16364aProof

Return gold#b9974fLinework

Clay#b65e4aHuman heat

Public voice

Clear, grounded, and specific.

We describe the company through work people can see: routes, records, decisions, products, producer confidence, and market discipline.

Use

Concrete operating language

Route, proof, readiness, value return, producer pathway, market fit, handoff, review, reinvestment, relationship.

Avoid

Empty scale language

We do not describe ourselves as frictionless, disruptive, world-leading, or transformational unless the evidence can carry the claim.

Te reo Maori

Use with work attached

Terms such as kai, manaaki, utu, whenua, and kaitiakitanga should sit beside real decisions, obligations, and records.

People images

Specific beats perfect

Use people who look lived-in, busy, and distinct. Preserve age, weather, focus, and working texture.

Location mix

Show the company across places

Offices, cold rooms, producer sites, wharves, route desks, market visits, reports, and public meetings all belong.

Product images

Products matter, but not every frame

Show product readiness, packaging, proof, route handling, and category fit without turning the website into a catalogue.

Design standards

The system is restrained because the work is complex.

Aotea Kai materials should feel designed, but never decorative for its own sake. The identity works best when it supports judgement: what moved, what was proved, what was selected, what returned, and what is developing next.

Use the mark with space

Give the route-and-return mark enough room to breathe. It should not be crowded by badges, slogans, partner logos, or decorative icons.

Keep photos working

Use offices, route boards, cold rooms, producer sites, wharves, product-readiness tables, public meetings, and reports. Avoid making every image a plate or a smiling group.

Let proof look like proof

Evidence, maps, route cards, report pages, quality notes, and claim records should feel legible and serious, not like a generic infographic pack.

Keep type honest

Use serif headlines for public gravity and sans-serif detail for decisions, figures, captions, navigation, and notes. Do not over-scale type inside compact controls.

Stamp, embossing, low-colour, and small-production use.

Open SVG

Report

Year In Review

The public report that gives the brand its evidence base.

Open report