Swerve / This is a story about how a music-driven cycling studio, upended by the pandemic's shift to at-home workouts, used a brand refresh and new website to carry its in-studio energy into digital classes and new gym partnerships.

Logo of Swerve, a teal stylized 'S' and the word 'SWERVE' in white text on a black background.
A young man in black athletic wear riding a stationary exercise bike in front of a colorful, abstract background with yellow and teal shapes.
A woman with short hair wearing a yellow workout top, concentrating while riding a stationary bike in a gym with a dark background and overhead lights.
A map of New York City with a teal location marker and a black banner with white text that says 'BOOK NOW' and 'CRUNCH 34TH STREET, 30 W 18th St'.
A woman in a gray sports bra with black band, posing confidently against a colorful yellow and green geometric background, with a black banner at the bottom containing white text and a black header with the Swerve logo.
Two people, a man and a woman, laughing and talking in a gym. The man is on an exercise bike, and windows can be seen in the background. Text on the right side describing an indoor cycling studio and a call-to-action button.
An app interface with a request form for a Swerve service, featuring fields for studio name and zip code, a submit button, and an image of a man drinking water from a bottle at the gym with informational text about offering Swerve to various businesses.

Project Information

Stage

Early

Industry

Health & Wellness

Services

Branding
Web Design

Impact Points

Health & Wellbeing

  • As a B Corp, Odd Notion only partners with founders building products that benefit people and planet. We sort that commitment into three tiers:

    • Measured impact — brands with verified, certified outcomes, like a fellow B Corp.

    • Unmeasured impact — brands doing real good that haven't yet quantified it.

    • Do no harm — brands we're proud to build because of how they operate.

    Swerve sits in our unmeasured-impact tier. As a music-driven studio built on group classes, it promotes physical and mental wellbeing and the connection that comes from moving together — making fitness energizing and communal rather than solitary. The good is inherent to what Swerve offers; it simply hasn't been formally measured.

Situation

Swerve, a high-energy fitness studio offering group cycling classes, established itself as a prominent player in the fitness landscape since its inception in 2013. The brand is synonymous with a music-driven fitness experience that fuses cycling, running, strength training, and more.

Problem

The advent of the pandemic led to a seismic shift in workout routines, with a majority of fitness enthusiasts transitioning from in-studio classes to at-home workouts. This posed a significant challenge to Swerve, which had primarily focused on an in-studio model. Furthermore, Swerve was faced with the task of maintaining its brand presence and awareness in a new partnership with TechnoGym and Crunch gyms in New York.

Solution

Embracing the challenge, Swerve teamed up with us to reimagine its brand in this new context. We retained the core elements of Swerve's existing logo while refreshing the typography and colors for enhanced visual appeal. The Swerve mark was innovatively used as a motif to symbolize the team spirit inherent in Swerve's fitness philosophy. This rebranding effort culminated in the creation of patterns that added a dash of energy and fun to the Swerve experience. The refreshed brand identity was then seamlessly integrated into the digital landscape, ensuring that Swerve's essence was effectively communicated in both live and pre-recorded classes.

Credits

Strategy: Bertha
Creative Direction: Bertha
Graphic Design: Eleazar Ruiz
Web Design: Eleazar Ruiz
Web Development: Eleazar Ruiz
Tone & Voice: Bertha
Motion Design: Bertha
Identity Design: Mackey Saturday

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