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do a consultation via a survey, we actually sat down with
them to create the brief that we gave to the developers. We
showed the final designs to the young people and asked if
they thought it closely met their brief, and it did.’
Creating a brand that could appeal across the age ranges
covered by the services isn’t necessarily easy when that goes
from as young as ten up to 25, not to mention parents, carers
and the professionals who might direct young people towards
the services. ‘But it seems to have been effective in meeting
these diverse needs,’ he says. ‘Visual identity is important to
young people, and hopefully this brand will appeal to young
people universally and encourage engage ment where others
may not have traditionally done so.’
In terms of the challenges facing young people’s services
generally, while cannabis and alcohol are still the main
reasons for presenting, the key issue is ‘not only the
substances being used by young people who present, it’s the
substances being used by young people who don’t present,
and are at increased risk’, he states. This could be down to a
lack of awareness around services generally, or the simple
fact that they don’t see their substance use as an issue that
needs addressing, he points out.
The substances falling into that latter category include
NPS, PIEDs and even ‘smart’ drugs. ‘This can be seen as more
aspirational use to better themselves rather than engaging
in any particular risk to their health. And where excessive
alcohol and cannabis use is normalised in peer groups, or
substances are used as a coping mechanism, there can be a
reluctance to access services for support. Responding to this
“hidden” risk is an important prevention agenda and the
marketing of our services is a key factor here in terms of
proactive engagement.’
To help achieve this, all of CGL’s services now adopt a
‘peripatetic’ model, he points out. ‘It’s very rare that we
operate from premises where we’d expect young people to
come to us to access support or any kind of intervention. We
go out to young people to offer one-to-one appointments,
but we also try to increase visibility by being in places young
people are – not in an intrusive way, but just so we can
engage and open up conversations in a more meaningful
way around drugs and alcohol.’
This could be in-reach work with partner agencies where
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people could benefit from drug and alcohol advice,
such as sexual health services, youth hostels, children’s
homes, A&E, or schools and colleges, or via traditional
street outreach in the community, the night-time economy,
festivals or fresher’s fairs. There’s also a major focus on whole-
family approaches and delivering interventions to parents,
carers and wider family members. ‘For a lot of our young
people their key protective factor is their parent or carer, so
trying to involve them in any support that we offer the young
person is in both their interests,’ he says.
Perhaps crucially, the ‘we won’t judge you or tell you
what to do’ message is as prominent on much of the
literature as the description of the service or contact details.
‘When we’ve done consultations, often the reluctance to
engage is because they may think they’re going to get a
lecture or be told to stop using substances. They’re not
always going to want to stop, and there might be young
people who feel ashamed or guilty about their substance
use, so that’s a barrier to accessing services. So we thought
we needed to address that one head on in some of our key
branding messages.’
However good the branding is, there’s little point unless
it’s used properly, however. ‘We wanted to better
understand how young people learn about our services – a
lot are searching for information on substances or other
support services online, so it’s about how we make this
brand compatible with a real sound, comprehensive digital
presence,’ he states.
‘The national rebrand is to create a recognisable brand for
young people, raising the profile of CGL as a specialist
provider of young people’s substance misuse support,
information and advice,’ he continues. ‘Expert advice is
important for young people – they told us that they’re more
likely to engage if they know that the service or worker “really
knows their stuff” – more than they might easily be able to
access online. I think that consistent brand will help young
people recognise it and trust it for up-to-date, accurate,
relevant advice. There’s a whole host of information out there
of varying degrees of quality, so that’s something that we’re
really keen to do in terms of raising that profile and that trust
and credibility among young people.’ DDN
They... wanted
images that
‘represented
young people
in general’
rather than
pictures of
the type
of people
generally
perceived as
‘substance
misusers’
June 2017 | drinkanddrugsnews | 13