Effort underway for rebranding
After more than 60 years of supporting individuals with intellectual and other developmental disabilities, the Niagara County chapter of NYSARC Inc., Opportunities Unlimited of Niagara Inc., and the NYSARC Inc. Cattaraugus County chapter, an affiliate of The ReHabilitation Center, announced that the board of directors of both agencies have approved the merger of the two organizations. Each agency is a chapter of The Arc New York.
Mari Howard, president and CEO of the merged entity said, "The Arc New York contacted The ReHabilitation Center two years ago and requested assistance in determining the future viability of the Niagara County chapter. We recognized that the missions and visions were very similar and combining the resources of both organizations would strengthen the agency and enhance the ability to support people with disabilities across a larger demographic area."
Each organization has a rich history of supporting people with disabilities for over 60 years, and although the board of directors and staff from each agency realize that preserving the critical components of their respective history was essential, it was equally important to define a unified brand that would sustain the mission of each organization.
"The scope and complexity of rebranding the two organizations into one required specialized expertise. We engaged a Buffalo based company, Brandcrush Creative, to assist us with the process. Over the past year, Brandcrush held several meetings with both organizations that included people supported by the agencies, multiple levels of staff and board members to gather input around what qualities they felt would be most important moving forward as one agency," said Howard.
It became apparent that a critical component to successfully fulfilling the mission would be working together with each of the stakeholders. Ultimately, a unified agency with a name that represented two agencies coming together for a common purpose, working together with the people it supports to provide services that are focused on their wants and needs and working together with the communities to create opportunities for people with disabilities to live fully integrated lives was needed.
"It was evident that our new agency name should embrace the concept of working together with people in a multitude of capacities. With that in mind, I am pleased to share that Opportunities Unlimited of Niagara will now be operating as Intandem. Same people, same purpose, new name. We are confident that the name Intandem, along with our new tagline "People - Purpose - Progress," successfully represents the ongoing commitment to working together with the people supported, other providers and members of the communities to ensure that the much needed quality services that have been provided for more than 60 years can continue for many years to come," said Howard.
