National Senior Living | Experience Senior Living
Problem
In 2022, NexCore Group had a vision to create a new kind of senior living company, one that challenged traditional perceptions of aging through hospitality, wellness, culinary, and elevated lifestyle experiences. Before a single community was open, the organization needed a visual identity, but also a brand strategy capable of supporting long-term national growth.
The challenge was to define the new senior living organization's purpose, create a scalable brand architecture, and develop a marketing foundation that could support multiple community experiences from art, music, high-end diverse culinary, fitness, hospitality, and most importantly, a sense of community while maintaining a cohesive corporate identity.
Beginning in 2022, ShuBu Creative Group embarked on a multi-year partnership with NexCore Group to help support the development of the Experience Senior Living brand, including the sub-brands under the umbrella and the foundational assets.
Solution
Phase 1 | Brand Strategy & Architecture (2022)
ShuBu Creative Group began the engagement by leading an immersive brand strategy workshop with ESL's executive leadership. Through collaborative discovery sessions, we facilitated leadership workshops to define the organization's vision, positioning, target audiences, values, and long-term growth strategy.
That strategic foundation led to the creation of Experience Senior Living (ESL). We presented a “house of brands” positioning and used the Marriott as an example, showing a strategy that would hold a scalable brand architecture designed to support future expansion. We developed brand identities for:
The Reserve
ESL’s premier luxury collection, designed around elevated hospitality and refined living.
The Gallery
A vibrant lifestyle brand inspired by art, music, creativity, and culture.
Sancerre
A socially driven brand centered on connection, engagement, and community.
The Crossings
A welcoming, approachable brand offering a more traditional senior living experience.
As the brands evolved, additional agencies were brought in to further expand portions of the visual identities for select collections. ShuBu remained an integral strategic partner throughout the process, ensuring continuity while continuing to guide the overall brand vision and marketing strategy.
Phase 2 | Bringing the Brand to Life (2023–2024)
With the brand architecture established, ShuBu helped transform the strategy into a comprehensive marketing platform that could support community development nationwide. This included:
Website design
Collateral - brochures, business cards, vehicle wraps, etc.
Digital Marketing
Public Relations
Phase 3 | Growth, Marketing & Public Relations (2025–2026)
As new communities prepared to open, ShuBu expanded its role to include integrated marketing strategy, public relations, grand opening campaigns, professional photography, lead generation optimization, and fractional marketing leadership. The team also supported executive visibility, agency coordination, website optimization, and marketing initiatives that helped strengthen lead quality and occupancy across the portfolio.
Impact
Marketing:
Over the course of the partnership, ShuBu helped transform Experience Senior Living from an early-stage concept into a nationally recognized senior living organization with a scalable brand platform supporting communities across the United States.
There are now properties in Colorado, Maryland, Florida, Indiana, Ohio and Virginia.
Key accomplishments include:
Created the Experience Senior Living master brand through a comprehensive brand strategy process.
Developed four differentiated community brands that continue to support portfolio growth.
Built a scalable brand architecture that enabled national expansion.
Designed marketing systems and creative assets supporting seven communities.
Produced more than 500 digital advertisements in addition to websites, brochures, signage, sales collateral, and other branded materials.
Served as a long-term strategic branding, marketing, and public relations partner throughout the organization's growth.
Public Relations:
One of the partnership's most successful initiatives was the Grand Opening of The Gallery at Fort Collins, where ShuBu led all public relations and media relations with just 2.5 months to execute. The team developed the PR strategy, built media and influencer relationships from scratch, coordinated political and professional referral outreach, and managed all on-site media engagement.
The campaign generated measurable results, including:
900+ press release publication pickups
550+ grand opening attendees
Seven major earned media placements
Coverage in Colorado Real Estate Journal, McKnight's Senior Living, Senior Housing News, iAdvance Senior Care, The Colorado Gazette, The Coloradoan, and Fort Collins City Lifestyle
More than 100 targeted media contacts developed
More than 20 industry and referral partner relationships established
Community inquiries increased 132% compared to March
Occupancy increased from 21% to 27%
Website traffic surged during the campaign, with 18,000 active users and 86,000 website events
In just 2.5 months, ShuBu built the media, political, and professional referral foundation that often takes six months or longer to establish, positioning The Gallery at Fort Collins as Northern Colorado's premier luxury senior living destination while strengthening the visibility of both Experience Senior Living and NexCore Group.
Real Estate Development | Elkco Properties
We helped Elkco Properties pull together a portfolio to showcase more than 30 years of real estate acquisitions, developments and investments, spanning six states and employing 300 associates. The company printed 250 of these books to give to potential partners, investors, loan officers, city officials, etc. to identify new opportunities, attract investors and reach new markets.
Healthcare Real Estate Development | Sun Life Health
Problem
Sun Life Health (SLH) is a quality healthcare network and provider in Pinal County, Arizona. Their resources and reputation have grown over the last 45+ years and they came to ShuBu Creative to update their brand and messaging to better reflect who they are in today’s market. After a deep analysis, we discovered several key areas in need of alignment for both consistency and clarity.
We found that they had inconsistent branding across service lines, different naming conventions and slightly varying logos at their various locations. In fact, we determined that the logo and colors were very similar to Walmart’s branding, which ultimately translated to a discount feel in the consumer’s eye and did not show the depth and breadth of what they offered— top quality healthcare.
Through focus groups and our signature interview process, it was revealed that the word 'center,' which appeared in all their service lines, had different meanings to prospective patients. Finally, we found very little diversity in their marketing assets despite locations in very diverse areas.
Solution
We began by renaming Sun Life Family Healthcare Center to Sun Life Health. Next, we created a brand and visual identity to reflect that they are quality, reputable healthcare providers for everyone, regardless of race, age or socio-economic status. We updated the color palette to a brighter, more modern aesthetic- one unique to SLH. In addition to redesigning the logo to mark a sun moving in a circle, symbolizing innovative patient-centric care, we also changed all of their brand and marketing photography to be more inclusive and diverse. Finally, we launched a new messaging platform with more engaging, value-driven language to ensure connection with the audience.
Impact
Sun Life Health now has solid brand guidelines and consistent branding across all channels. Since the re-brand, the organization has received several community recognitions, federal grants and awards. Executives at the hospital reported that they show an increase in awareness in the community by the volume of phone calls and appointments being made. They also reported the branding has also made recruiting easier, there have been fewer recruiting issues since redesigning the brand and website.
Real Estate Development | Springwood Retirement
Springwood Retirement is wwned and operated by our client, Elkco Properties, an established Denver-based developer. Springwood Retirement Campus needed a modern update. We worked with Springwood Retirement Campus to update and freshen up all of their marketing to be simple, impactful and storytelling in nature. The butterfly theme was seen throughout the original branding as well as a symbol throughout the retirement campus itself, which inspired ShuBu to bring it into the new visual identity .
Real Estate Development | The Reserve at Lone Tree
It's always a unique challenge to create a house of brands. Experience Senior Living develops senior housing communities across the country. Their newest community, The Reserve in Lone Tree, will break the mold of traditional seniors housing communities, allowing residents, families and team members to experience luxury living together.
Leveraging a strategy mimicking the hotel house of brands, Bonvoy Marriot, we developed four brand identities that encompass forward-thinking experiences in senior living: The Reserve, The Gallery, Sancerre and The Crossings all under the family of Experience Senior Living communities across the country.
We created the Experience Senior Living umbrella brand first to house varying levels of innovative housing for seniors from affordable, premium to luxury.
Check out The Reserve!
Real Estate Development | Latitude40
Bringing this 20-year in the making brand to life has been an honor. Every detail is the ideation of the founder himself, Jay Hebb. From helping Jay name his brokerage, to creating signage and finding unique ways to represent his investment, development and residential real estate portfolio with the utmost integrity has been key to developing the Latitute40 brand.
Real Estate Development | Farmhouse Villas
We helped Elkco Properties, an established Denver-based development company with a name, logo, visual identity, aerial photographs, content and execution of an extensive 15+ page pitch deck for investors. The deck went out to potential investors, and the development was fully funded to go forward and is located in Lone Tree, Colorado.
Real Estate Development | Mikvah of East Denver
Problem
A unique development was coming to the Jewish Community in Denver—this project entailed developing a brand for a Mikvah 'coming soon to Denver. While the Mikvah was not operational, the goal was to raise enough money to sustain construction.
Therefore, we need a strong brand that catches high-end donors' attention.
Solution
While being built, we developed a strategy to promote the construction project and gain awareness in the community with a vibrant and relevant visual identity and messaging system. The messaging was open to anyone and education-focused, while the visual identity needed to be fresh and modern.
Impact
The brand reflected a water-like feel derived from what a Mikvah is for the Jewish community. The dots resembled a Jewish star within the design, which was modern and catchy. In addition, a watercolorist enhanced the brand by texturing the renderings and photographs, giving the entire brand an elevated and classy feel.
We helped a 20-year in the making vision come to life and launch in six months. Now, the Mikvah not only raised $250 Million in the capital, but they are also up and running now and serving the Jews in Denver and surrounding areas.