athlos college coaching
Crafting a new brand to build trust and confidence
Joe Accordino founded Athlos in 2021 with the mission to improve the golf recruiting process. After a decade at ESPN, he set out to build a sports business that addresses the challenges families face navigating the complex NCAA recruiting system. In under a year, Joe launched Athlos, which has since grown to serve over 40 clients, becoming a leading college golf recruiting service in California.
Timeline
Joe brought me on board to design a new brand and website for Athlos. Our goal was to craft a brand identity that feels approachable and trustworthy, setting the stage for the company's successful launch. From ideation to final brand identity, the entire project took just four weeks.
Background
When Joe first approached me with the company concept, I immediately envisioned a pathway forward for each and every student. Athlos’ mission was to shepherd student-athletes through the recruitment process and transform a winding, complex road into something more straightforward. So I began to iterate on the capital A in Athlos, imagining the shape as the hand of a compass or a leading pathway
Iteration
While the concept was well received, the mark didn’t quite hit the spot for me. There was still room for improvement. I learned that when parents looked at the NCAA recruiting process, they often felt overwhelmed by the paperwork and regulations. Athlos was offering a way forward and the logo needed to incorporate this notion.
The revised design was made more dynamic, adding the forward tilt to fit perfectly with the selected wordmark.
Brand Identity involves so much more than a logo. It’s about how you present yourself. As a startup, one of their priorities was to be approachable and trustworthy. This was paramount as many of their first clients were taking a leap with an unproven newcomer.
Color Palette
Through color psychology, I designed a brand palette primarily to generate relief, hope, and joy. Blues are so often associated with trust and relief, I knew this would be the base. From there, I added shades of teal to bring in a sense of freshness. Small touches of yellow and red were added as accent colors to evoke joy and energy.
Typography
I wanted to blend a bold, straightforward font with a handwritten font to add an element of human touch to the brand. ITC Avant Garde would serve as the base font for the brand with an accent font, Mervale Script, to use for callouts.
Imagery
Since Athlos' focus is on golfers, I wanted the imagery to evoke promise for the young student-athletes. Much of the imagery is set during golden hour on the course, while showing each golfer in action or post-tournament success.
Athlos required a website that was both informative and easy to use. If one of your core tenets is simplification, the website experience needed to convey that. As a result, I designed a clean, six-page website that showcased their expertise, their process, and enabled quick conversion for prospective clients.
The result is a sophisticated look, balancing validation and information, with intuitive interactions.
Now two years later, the Athlos College Coaching brand continues to grow. Through social media, webinars, collateral, and a brand new website, Athlos is reaching more student-athletes every year.
50
student athletes boosted
24
college commitments
11
Division-one commitments
3
Ivy leaguers
“The toughest part of running a small business is undoubtedly the early stages. Fortunately, Chris kickstarted everything creatively for Athlos, from building a complete brand identity to a fully functional, easy-to-use website.”
Joe Accordino
Co-Founder of Athlos College Coaching