B&C sat down with CEO, Jonathan Samuels (pictured above, right) and sales and marketing director, Josh Knight (pictured above, left), to discuss the inspiration behind the company’s new aesthetics and how it reflects the lender itself.

The rebrand has produced a redesigned logo and carefully selected colour scheme, as well as a revamped website showcasing project and personnel-based imagery.

Jonathan’s vision for how the company wants to present itself has changed since its conception in 2017. The firm’s rebrand has been designed to highlight the evolution of Octane, its personality, and the place it wants to carve for itself within the industry.

“As a natural process of business evolution, we wanted to tweak our brand, make it more contemporary and relevant to various things that we're doing,” explained Jonathan.

The company’s previous logo which incorporated a wave was designed to demonstrate Octane’s concentration on complex cases and exemplify the idea that, like waves, every case is different.

However, after seven years of trading, Octane’s offerings and where it sees itself in the market has shifted.

“What we do has evolved, we're now a far cheaper price proposition, we will compete heavily now with challenger banks on pricing,” added Jonathan.

“In many ways we think of ourselves as a bridging lender with challenger bank pricing.

“While every loan is indeed different, we also recognise it’s not only large, complex loans that make up our book, we are also completing high levels of smaller, more straightforward loans too,” Jonathan continued.

Josh too acknowledged that Octane’s new product offerings have influenced its decision to change the branding — including the release of its variable bridging rate product in 2022 which opened the doors to a new set of clients.

But it’s not just the lender’s bridging offer which has been a driver for change according to Josh. He noted Octane’s refurbishment product and its popularity as something that has inspired the new look.

“Our refurbishment product is one of our most popular offerings. The product helps investors to improve a property’s value or improve its income potential — whether that be a light or heavy refurbishment to existing residential or semi-commercial property or a change of use project —the product is extremely popular for house to HMO conversions.”

Josh also highlighted Octane’s development exit product popularity which has been driven by the rise in build costs and the increased length of time it takes for properties to sell which the company has witnessed.

“We want the imagery that we use throughout our branding to make it really clear that these are the types of projects that we are completing at volume, and the more of them you complete, the more adept you become at completing them, and the more synonymous the brand becomes with them,” said Josh.

With Octane also creating itself a solid footing with projects which require a level of refurbishment works, Jonathan wanted the rebrand to firmly set Octane as an expert in this area.

With the diversity of this product, such as decorations or heavier works, including commercial to residential conversions, Jonathan wants Octane to be the first name that comes to mind: 
"We know our product is very strong on it. We know our experience is really strong on it, and we want to be out there, so everybody knows we're the go to for refurbishment projects,” said Jonathan.

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As the products change and the lender reaches out to a new and wider audience, Jonathan felt that a clean and simple image also hinted at Octane’s utilising of technology elements to create a snappier process — also reflected in the  simplifying of the company name and largely removing ‘Capital’ from its marketing, and instead relying on ‘Octane’.

But while the firm means to visualise its move towards its use of technology and the streamlining of processes, among other factors that would appeal to potential borrowers and brokers, this could not divert from the people-focussed work that Jonathan and his team are committed to.

“People buy from people, rate is important, and leverage is important, but that confidence of getting the deal done and knowing that you'll deliver, that's actually the most important thing. That’s why we have put members of our team front and centre,” said Jonathan.

The relationships built on this sentiment may be key, especially with brokers, and the rebrand has been important in reaching out to those who have dealt with the company before.

But to Josh these are just the tip of the iceberg and an emphasis on a people-based marketing strategy could be the tool to reach out further.

“We hope that brokers who deal with us regularly view us as approachable, friendly and trustworthy, but the new branding is a way of underlining this to new brokers too,” said Josh.

“We want brokers that land on our website, or that engage with our marketing material, to feel like if they contact us, they're going to be met with a friendly response from somebody that is very experienced,” he added.

The people-based marketing strategy has also aimed at bringing the company’s culture and personality to the front and centre for all to see.

Josh said, “We take what we do very seriously, but we have good fun doing it. We really wanted that personality we have internally to shine through the branding. We want to be a fun, vibrant, modern brand and we want people to have a sense of that personality.”

In this mission, the branding has brought the personalities and people forward, by placing the faces which make up the lender on the landing page.

The colours which Octane chose in the months-long process were also very deliberately selected to further portray a company personality.

Jonathan and Josh scoured through the colour systems in competitor logos to put their finger on what represented a more conservative style and what portrayed an edgier image, knowing that the former was far from what they were aiming for.

“We're not conservative in our approach to lending or how we deal with clients or indeed ourselves, our personality isn't like that, so we were clear that wasn't us,” said Jonathan.

“We felt that our existing branding was perhaps in the middle of this spectrum, but we wanted to move more towards a lighter, clear, cleaner, more consumer-focused aesthetic,” he continued.

Its refurbishment product has also been brought closer into the picture, with the use of project-based imagery throughout the branding.

Sending the message of reliability to the consumer is where Octane has aimed its shot, hoping to convey the processes involved in a project, from its initial start to a successful finish.

The relationships and personality which the company has built, as well as its expansion in offerings and new focus on projects which require refurbishment works, are elements which Josh and Jonathan wanted to convey in Octane’s new style, one that carries with it a certain objective and message, when Josh said:
“The theme that underpins the whole brand is this idea of enabling progress.

“Whether it’s at process level — pushing our broker’s cases to completion, or whether at project level – helping our borrowers to turn their ideas from plans to profit, we want to be known as a driving force behind that progress.”