Hub Group Charts a Modern Path Forward With a Unified Brand and Digital Experience
An intermodal shipping company grows its reputation as a tech-forward innovator while remaining true to its service-oriented roots.
Overview
If you’ve taken a road trip — or just a trip across town — you’ve probably passed a Hub Group semi-trailer or train car. The intermodal shipping company’s green containers have criss-crossed the country since 1971, and during those 50 years, Hub Group has been in constant motion.
A series of acquisitions expanded their capabilities, while proprietary, industry-first technology established them as a logistics powerhouse, offering end-to-end visibility and service across the entire supply chain. But even as the company modernized behind the scenes, the way the brand was represented in the market lagged behind.
impressions from earned placements
growth in first-time visitors YOY
Increase in search impressions
The Challenge
Despite Hub Group’s transformation into a full-scale supply chain solutions provider, its brand presence told a different story. The company’s website and visual identity reflected its origins, not its future – underplaying its tech-forward innovation, operational scale and people-centric values. When Hub Group approached Walker Sands for support, the goal was to shift perception: to elevate the brand to reflect a modern, trustworthy and future-ready leader in logistics, without losing sight of its founding principles.
At the same time, fragmentation within the brand structure – including several acquisitions still operating under their own identities – led to inconsistency and confusion. Hub Group needed a unified story, a cohesive identity and a scalable platform for growth.
The Solution
Walker Sands didn’t just deliver a brand refresh – we became Hub Group’s Agency of Record (AOR), leading a fully integrated marketing program that spanned research and strategy development through execution. At the core of our partnership was a deep understanding of Hub Group’s values and aspirations. We began by learning more about its audiences through internal and external interviews and a market landscape analysis, zooming in on key trends and competitor insights to understand how to not only move the brand forward, but continue its deep differentiation in the market.
The result of our brand exercise was a recommendation to ground the brand in its internal mantra: “The Way Matters” – a philosophy that shaped not only how the company operates, but how it communicates. That concept evolved into a forward-facing tagline, “The Way Ahead,” which captured both legacy and progress. It spoke to the method and mission of Hub Group’s work, signaling innovation, momentum and a steadfast focus on customers.
With a goal of building a brand that felt both bold and trustworthy, we reimagined Hub Group’s visual identity – retaining the equity of their iconic green while introducing a refined, monochromatic palette that elevated their presence in a crowded category. Inspired by the geometry of Hub Group’s hexagonal logo, we introduced the “focal point,” a signature design element used across brand materials to frame content and direct attention, reflecting the company’s unwavering focus on customer success.
Beyond brand development, we executed a full-scale digital transformation. The new website served as a modern expression of the brand and a key functional tool for prospective and current customers. We simplified the company’s product architecture, merging previously siloed acquisitions into a single, intuitive structure under the Hub Group name. This overhaul clarified the breadth of Hub Group’s offerings and allowed users to more easily understand their end-to-end capabilities. Custom photography and video – shot across locations including the California coastline – brought authenticity and human connection to the brand’s digital and campaign materials.
To maximize the impact of the new brand, Walker Sands built a plan to engage internal and external audiences with the new brand, internally focusing on education, training and enablement , including a plan for employee rollout. The team also developed a detailed external rollout plan, including timelines in alignment with the website, campaigns, and collateral needs to ensure a cohesive, consistent brand from the day of launch.
As AOR, our work didn’t stop at launch. We executed a series of integrated campaigns across digital, social, print and video, building on the brand’s new momentum with content that generated awareness and drove demand. From immersive landing pages and social ads to lobby screen creative and print placements, we extended the brand through every channel. Simultaneously, we supported business development goals through strategic demand generation and performance-driven marketing that tied creative outputs to pipeline results, ensuring every activation delivered impact.
The Results
The success of this partnership was defined not by the new elements we added to the Hub Group brand, but through the long-term equity we retained. The modern Hub Group that emerged is a natural evolution: a customer-focused leader whose cutting-edge technology and solutions define the way ahead – both for itself and for the industry.
