Bonfire Branding & Communications

🔎 Rumi says that what you seek is also seeking you. It's a lot easier to be found when you're being consistent.

🧠 Work with The Brain
5 to 7 exposures of your brand is what it takes for your audience to remember your brand or message. Stay consistent!

🎨 Understand the Power of Color
The right brand colors evoke emotion and influence your audience, choose your color impact wisely.

🔁 Consistency Is Vital
Your brand should be easily recognized across all of your platforms. Consistently reinforce your brand, voice, and message to leave a lasting impression on your audience.

Whether you're looking for consulting, custom brand design, or help with marketing, our team is here to help empower you and your brand to be sought after and found. 🎯

Behind the scenes on our rebranding adventure with St. Regis Travel Center. 💭

Not only were we tasked with designing their primary logo, but we also embraced the challenge of crafting unique logos for each of their internal storefronts.

The owner-operators of St. Regis Travel Center were determined to bring a fresh, modern vibe to their long-standing establishment's look. 🎨 While their legacy was strong, they were ready to unveil an identity that truly reflects their vibrant offerings - beyond just a pit stop, they're a destination in themselves! ✨ They even have a dog park for your best friends. 🐕 🐩

Here's a sneak peek into our design journey, where every concept was crafted with passion, even if it didn't make the final cut.

If you're feeling ready to talk about a rebrand, we'd love to hear from you. Find us online at www.bonfire-brands.com.

Tonight at The Wilma - be there for the world premiere of 399: Queen of the Tetons! Famed wildlife photographer and film participant Images of Nature-Tom Mangelsen will be in attendance, and Missoula is sure lucky to be the first in the nation to see this film. Go Griz!
Big Sky Documentary Film Festival
If you can't be there in person, there is an option to stream from home. See the Big Sky Film Fest site for details!

399: Queen of the Tetons | Big Sky Documentary Film Festival The Big Sky Documentary Film Festival celebrates the art of nonfiction film by giving voice to the powerful ideas that come forth in documentary. The festival is an important international platform, blending our inspiring Rocky Mountain setting with filmmaking of exceptional merit and artistic innov...

Peace and love.

Missoula: We are offering our DIY yule log workshop at Wester Cider on 12/17 1 pm. Materials provided include larch log, 3 taper candles, pine cones, cinnamon sticks, evergreens, dried oranges, mistletoe and fresh holly. You will bring home a gorgeous yule log to use as a centerpiece or burn on solstice. $64 🎄Tickets are limited! Register and purchase tickets here: https://www.crescentridgefarmmt.com/events/2023/12/17/yule-log-workshop-westerncider

⭐️🙏We love designing beautiful brands for people creating positive impact in their communities!🙏⭐️

Wellspring is a startup medical practice in Missoula and is run by a human we absolutely fell in love with for being so graciously heart-led.

The concept of a wellspring is that things begin somewhere. What is the origin or wellspring of our sense of belonging, our sense of self, comfort, joyousness?

Dr. Stephanie Supernaut gives her patients the gift of being comfortable in their own skin. Wellspring Health & Aesthetics is open for business!

Good design belongs everywhere.

Who's ready to grow? Picture this- you have marketing and business development wing-people giving you the support you need to move the meter on growth and development as a brand. 🚀
How would that feel? We love helping intact teams get to the next level, or if you don't have internal resources already, we can get you moving toward structured marketing that's right for your business now, and expands as you do.
Experience growth and marketing efficiency by working with our fractional marketing team.
Sound like something you'd welcome? Message us anytime to chat and learn more.

What if you could access a full-scale marketing team without the challenges of recruiting or hiring anyone? Fractional Marketing might just be your answer.

Partnering with a fractional team is a progressive approach to increasing your marketing bandwidth, and lets you amplify your brand with just the right amount of expert help designed to get your marketing effforts working for you. 🔥
Reach out and let’s chat if this sort of help is something you’d welcome in your business.

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✨Logo Package & Website Design✨ Have you ever practiced restorative yoga while listening to live harp music and vocals that brought you to another place? Have you looked up from the floor and seen the sky through the bubble at the top of the yurt, marveled at the construction’s structure and felt grateful for the stars? If not, now you know where to go.

sits tucked up against wilderness, at the base of a remarkable mountain and beside a mighty river. The colors, winds, sunsets, the animals…they bring us closer to our true nature. We were thrilled when Jessica from Wildlight asked if we could chat about branding and there’s nothing better than her words to describe the process of designing the brand identity and website for a place so close to our hearts. Thank you Jess and Charlei, so much, for being incredible co-creators, and for creating places and spaces for humans to be more human.

You can see all of Jess’s original post on the Wlidlight feed, but here are some of her words that gave us the feels. Photographs by the wonderful , and the yurt was made by right here in Missoula.

"A few months ago we embarked on our branding journey with  and we couldn’t be more pleased with the unique design they put together for us with their team.

Our friend  had a vision of the yurt roof being included, from the vantage point of clients laying on the floor, gazing out the top dome at the sky. The team came up with several different versions, which were so hard to choose from. We asked them to incorporate the cycles of nature, celestial elements, plants (look what they did with the wings!) and the hummingbird, from my original business — it’s one of my animals and we wanted to infuse in the joy and resilience of this little creature into the new space. The waxing crescent moon is at center, representing the creative period of each lunar cycle. The Bonfire team truly went above and beyond in pulling in all of our requests. I can’t recommend working with them enough."

Leaving the world better than they found it! Reducing landfill, taking some weight off the impact of a big event, helping us battle climate change. Composting is the coolest.

Go Missoula Compost!

Clients who enter the Bonfire family are often people we wish we’d known sooner- and Ashli at Morphos is one of those folks.

Her cleaning company was doing really well, and she felt like it was time to level up with a brand look that reflects her own unique story.

Morphos Homes is about leaving messy times behind and stepping into a space where both the head and heart can thrive. Ashli and her team meet people where they are and dig into creating not only a clean space, but an organized one.

We loved working on this brand identity package and are excited to see what happens next for this company as they have some big things in store.

Fun après work scene visiting our really incredible clients who are cooking up some amazing local food out of their custom designed fancy food truck! It’s always amazing to see our work out in the real world. Anyway, the fritter situation is out of hand. Definitely order them to go so you don’t accidentally eat two orders. Added bonus- stopping in at where designers can go and feel at home. Western Cider’s brand is on point. Stop in for a cider and see what a cohesive brand looks like. Kudos to the and Western Cider families for a sweet Friday happy hour good time.

We’ve worked our way through the flavor combos for a second time, took notes and snapped some pics at the lake. Pineapple helped spur conversation, and blackberry-lemon helped us think deeply. Additional reports on the other edibles to come after subsequent field trips. 10/10 would recommend.

Our clients are…generous 💗 and love this community. Way to go Missoula Compost.

February 17-26, Missoula. 20th Annual Big Sky Documentary Film Festival, where reality plays itself.

Curious about our 20th festival poster? We sat down with Blake Nicolazzo] from Bonfire Brands] to chat about this years’ artwork and the decade long relationship we have cultivated with them.

“Shortly after we opened our doors as an agency, we were alerted that an organization in our community could use some help navigating social media…ten years later we’re still pitching in. It has been such an honor through the years to witness, document, and share with the world the cast of characters that makes Big Sky what it is. We’ve met hundreds of filmmakers, and watched countless amazing films. We’ve cried and laughed and learned, and felt what it is to share the human experience through these past ten years in partnership with Big Sky. This year, the festival’s 20th, we got to do what we love best for an organization we treasure... create art.

We wanted to make something for Big Sky that reflects where they are now, and what they’ve created. It’s abundantly clear that making a film is incredibly interdisciplinary, and the same can absolutely be said for producing a film festival. To get either done, you have to be really good at a lot of things.

The art style we chose for this piece could be described as Bauhaus. We love the traditions of the Bauhaus movement and see parallels in spirit between the festival and the Bauhaus way. Both are movements that merge art and industry, and both celebrate bringing various crafts and mediums together under one roof.

The piece’s central figure is artful eyes- when you stop to think about how many eyes have been present at screenings over the past twenty years, you begin to understand the impact of this organization. One might also consider the lens of a camera, and the filmmakers themselves. Every film at Big Sky was an idea in one person’s mind, and they brought it to life. We applaud all of you, filmmakers and Big Sky Film Fest staff and supporters. What you have given the city of Missoula deserves an enormous round of applause.”

Big Sky’s work was created by Bonfire Brands] lead designer, , along with our creative director and founder, Blake Nicolazzo].

🔎🔍Up-close and personal view on a recent work; an art concept celebrating twenty years of a beloved Montana institution that has gifted us with years of art and inspired thinking. How do we increase our critical thinking skills and be great Americans? We think it’s by encouraging curiosity and pairing that with the practice of gathering information from diverse sources. Add in some critical thinking skills and you have the magic that will keep this country evolving.

So you’ve decided to rebrand your company- sounds fun! ;) We’re here when you’re ready.

Here are some tips that will help you go deep and emerge with a rebrand that’s worth the effort. The process can vary, but these way-finders will get you to the starting gate of your creative transformation truly informed. Once you get through these, you’re ready to start the redesign process and jump into creating the art that will best represent your brand. Rebrands are about more than changing up your logo, it’s a time to build strong legs for the future.

# rebrand

We supplied the original art for this delicious Bear Smart Beer can. Be sure to pick up a four-pack at Imagine Nation Brewing here in Missoula. It's a special release, so you'll only be able to get it while supplies last!
Coexistence is the way to go, and proceeds from the beer's sales will benefit the Bear Smart Action Fund- details are on the cans and at the Missoula for Bears page.

Is there one thing you can do to better coexist with your wild neighbors?

Missoula Bear Smart Beer is now available at Imagine Nation Brewing, Worden's Market, Big Head's Bottle Shop and Good Food Store Missoula!!
It’s a fruited sour that is incredibly easy drinking- refreshing and light yet complex flavor.
Get this special release beer before it sells out! Proceeds support our work to shore up conflict hot spots. 💗🐻

You know what’s awesome? Seeing our clients take big steps.

These two are leaving the world better than they found it, and it’s much more delicious.

Original logo art by Anomal press in partnership with our brand styling team!

We ❤️ Tandem Bakery

Couple starts ‘big dream’ with Tandem Bakery and Cafe near campus Sunday morning in the sleepy University District started with growling stomachs searching for a high carb item to satisfy their craving at a new local bakery.

Hank demands a powder day. He’s very much ahead on his task list and ready to call in the powder clause as soon as the snow falls.

Après 🔥

Does anyone else race just a little bit to make it to your special spots for eye candy moments like this? Does it hit just right when you make it? If so, you may be in love with some of the same things we are.

Join Turning the Wheel Missoula for an outdoor celebration on Halloween weekend! Bring your drum for the circle! 🪘🪵❤️‍🔥🧯

SAVE THE DATE: Sat, Oct 30th
Enchanted Forest will be outdoors around a glorious bonfire this year, so grab your coziest costume and join us under the moon for some family friendly fireside time!
Reserve tickets now: universe.com, search Enchanted Forest. Questions? [email protected]

Love our clients and the world they’re creating. 💗🌎

We at Missoula Compost are proud to introduce our new veggie-mobile. This is actually our same old truck with a new and fabulous look, thanks to Branding & Communications and Missoula GT Vinyl. Our veggie-mobile will be out on the streets this week, picking up your organic waste and putting out the vibe... the veggie vibe. 😎

Nice work at River City Roots Festival! Imagine if all events had a commitment to composting organic waste! Let’s fight climate change by keeping organic waste out of landfills!
Pro tip: compostable plastics must be sent to a composting facility or they don’t break down. Don’t fall for greenwashing that implies that compostable plastics are the solution. The only real solution is refusing single use of all kinds whenever possible, and it’s possible almost all the time.

We are very impressed with the zero waste efforts at City Roots Festival! We are honored to pick up organic waste at the event this year, and are impressed by minimal contamination in the green bins, due to many wonderful volunteers and mindful Missoulians!