The Brookhaven Tourism Promotional Council is looking forward to completing its branding and marketing campaign for the city in time for an Aug. 1 rollout.

At its June meeting, the council discussed how it wants to portray Brookhaven as a tourist destination.

BTPC member and Brookhaven-Lincoln County Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Garrick Combs said the council met with six marketing firms over the past several months and then scored the proposals they submitted before choosing Raborn Media of Jackson.

The BTPC has its own budget based on the city’s revenue from the lodging tax that was passed last summer. Estimates suggest they will have $75,000 to $100,000 to spend. The cost of the firm is expected to be half to two-thirds of their budget.

Tyler Raborn, investment marketing consultant with Raborn Media, said so far the project of creating a brand for Brookhaven is “coming along quite nicely.”

Raborn Media has been at work on creating a logo and slogan to be used across all marketing platforms for the council including a new website, Twitter account and Facebook page. Combs and other members including Ward 6 Alderman David Phillips discussed the importance of separating the new tourism image from the “Homeseeker’s Paradise” theme while keeping the personality of Brookhaven central.

Raborn and the council agreed that “Homeseeker’s Paradise” is a fine slogan within the community that describes what a great hometown Brookhaven is, but that it does not work from a tourism standpoint.

“We don’t want to diminish what’s been built, we want to build up on what’s been built,” Raborn said. “We want to establish — this [place] is good. It is a good hometown, it is a good retirement community, but there’s more to it than this. And you need to come and find out about it – and we need to put that into three or four words.”

Combs noted that Raborn seemed to understand and share the opinion of building on the image Brookhaven has historically had, while coming from a fresh angle that would entice people to visit.

Raborn brought a handful of stylistic mockups of potential logo designs for the council to give input on. Taking suggestions into consideration, Raborn will visit with more concrete options for the BTPC to decide on in a meeting July 16. The council said for the meeting they will invite the city Board of Aldermen as well as representatives from the Brookhaven-Lincoln County Chamber of Commerce for input.

The hope for the meeting is to leave with a brand that can be used to move forward with producing marketing materials.