the southwestern athletic conference (swac):
As the second oldest conference in division 1 athletics (ivy league is oldest), the swac has had a long and proud history. established in 1920, the swac is composed of 10 historically black colleges throughout AL, MS, LA, AK and TX. in terms of branding, the individual member institutions had not embraced a universal swac brand. unlike many other conferences, swac schools have a bond built from overcoming oppression and lifting up an entire race of people. it would be easy to build messages based entirely on the history of the conference and its member schools. being an athletic conference, swac needed to build credibility through the quality of its sports programs. what many people don’t realize is that these schools have produced some of the greatest athletes in the modern era. names like Walter Payton, Jerry Rice, Michael Strahan, Steve McNair, Doug Williams to name a few. the heart of the swac brand lies in honoring those that paved the road to equal rights and building awareness of the quality athletics today. to put it simply, honor the heritage. the work that follows is a sampling of the rebranding work done for the swac. the swac team: Mark Ervin-CW, Howard Pearlstein-CW, Blake Hicks-AD/Flash, Shannon Broom-AD.
