Tom Earnest Team
Brand Identity • Logo Design • Brand Guidelines
Overview
Tom Earnest is a Managing Broker at John L. Scott South Kitsap & Gig Harbor Regional Office with a strong presence in both real estate and his local community. He approached me to refresh his existing logo and create a more polished visual identity while staying aligned with John L. Scott’s established brand colors.
As an active broker with multiple listings and an extensive marketing presence—including more than 700 postcards and mailers sent to his client network—Tom needed a brand identity that felt professional, recognizable, and versatile across both print and digital marketing.
Tom was also highly collaborative throughout the process. His clear communication, openness to creative ideas, and consistent feedback made it possible to develop a refreshed identity that represented his business while complementing the John L. Scott brand.
Tom came to me looking for a complete refresh of the logo he had originally created in Canva. While he wanted to maintain the recognizable John L. Scott brand colors, he was ready for an identity that felt more polished, modern, and distinctive to his own business.
With creative freedom to explore a new direction, my challenge was to develop a one-of-a-kind logo that would stand on its own while still feeling connected to the John L. Scott brand. The final identity needed to be recognizable, versatile, and cohesive across Tom’s print and digital marketing.
The Challenge
My Role
Brand & Logo Designer
The Approach
I wanted to create a distinctive identity for Tom without relying too heavily on the visual clichés commonly associated with real estate. During my research, I found that many real estate logos use similar imagery—rooftops, houses, and keys—so I explored ways to reference the industry more subtly through typography.
My initial sketches focused on combining Tom’s name and initials with simplified architectural forms. I experimented with transforming the “E” in Earnest into a monogram paired with a roofline, as well as integrating the “M” in “Tom” with the shape of a house. These ideas allowed the real estate connection to become part of the letterforms rather than a separate, obvious icon.
As I refined the concepts digitally, I tested different arrangements, wordmarks, monograms, and roofline treatments to see which direction remained recognizable at different sizes and applications. The final direction incorporates the house form directly into “TOM,” creating a simple visual connection to real estate while allowing his name to remain the focus of the identity.
The result is a clean, modern logo that feels appropriate for the industry without being defined by it—giving Tom a recognizable identity that can work consistently across his postcards, mailers, business cards, signage, and digital marketing.
The Outcome
The completed visual identity provided The Earnest Team with a cohesive brand system that could be consistently applied across print, digital, social media, and real estate marketing materials.