Beyond the $4.6 Billion Deal: Using Brand Storytelling to Drive Post-Merger Success
Setting the stage for brand evolution
In a $4.6 billion deal, Solenis, a privately held global leader in sustainable water treatment and process improvement solutions, acquired Diversey Holdings, Ltd., a $3 billion public company offering cleaning, hygiene and infection prevention solutions.
The purchase of a larger, market-leading global company represented a pivotal moment in the Solenis brand evolution. With this deal, Solenis emerged with a unified presence in over 160 countries and an enhanced product portfolio designed to address the needs of customers in institutional and food & beverage markets in addition to their established pulp & paper, industrial and pool markets.
Harnessing this potential required Godfrey to tackle strategic and operational challenges:
- Shape a unified brand:
Bringing together two global brands with a combined legacy of over 218 years demanded a thoughtful approach that preserved their individual equity, drove brand awareness in new and existing markets and supported future growth. - Bridge internal cultures:
With a newly combined team of employees across diverse regions and cultures, the integration presented complexity that went beyond operations. To achieve alignment, the new brand expression would need to bridge cultural differences and establish a shared mission that connected both teams and created momentum. - Craft clear, scalable messaging:
It was essential to develop messaging that effectively communicated the value of the unified company. This messaging had to balance clarity, consistency and adaptability to resonate across global markets, cultural nuances and customer priorities.
- Tell a story rooted in sustainability:
The new brand narrative needed to integrate each company’s sustainability strengths into one seamless story that would serve as a competitive differentiator globally. - Operationalize the new brand:
Launching the refreshed brand would require bringing consistency and cohesion across communications and touchpoints, including digital platforms, sales tools and marketing materials.
Transforming strong messaging into creative magic
A project this big and bold requires the right data to build a targeted action plan. Our strategy team conducted deep research and collaborated extensively with Solenis and Diversey. That included dozens of internal and external stakeholder interviews and reviewing a lot of internal associate survey responses — more than 4,300 — to uncover the insights needed to shape a cohesive strategy.
Once strategy was finalized, we developed a messaging framework to position the expanded Solenis as a global leader in its existing and new markets. Building on our previous branding work with Solenis, we used sustainability as a narrative anchor that was both grounded in research and would resonate with internal teams, customers and other stakeholders.
In addition, we created brand and product hierarchies to define relationships between Solenis and its existing sub-brands, as well as guide branding relationships for future acquisitions.
Our creative team then brought this stage of the Solenis brand evolution to life. We designed a new logo that combines elements of the heritage Solenis and Diversey logos. The top portion of the logo represents Solenis customers, while the bottom portion represents the brand’s team supporting customers. In the center of the visual, negative space reveals the pathway of opportunity to drive efficiency, make a measurable impact and do what’s right for people and the planet. We also refreshed the brand palette to convey strength, clarity and sustainability.
And, to ensure creative alignment for globally distributed teams, we developed in-depth brand guidelines, a messaging playbook and branded digital assets, including social media post templates.
The creative work included a redesign of the Solenis website to reflect the brand’s refreshed look and feel. In addition, the website portion of the project included extensive work to integrate Diversey’s 120+ websites and related language sites. From content mapping to cookie and privacy compliance integration to migration support, the Godfrey team collaborated with the Solenis and heritage Diversey teams, as well as third-party vendors. We also provided post-launch support, including website updates and CMS training for Solenis and heritage Diversey. The result is a seamless, best-in-class online experience that makes it easy for new and legacy customers and stakeholders to get the information they need.
Unveiling a new vision for sustainability leadership
With bold vision, meticulous planning and dynamic execution, we helped Solenis transform the Diversey acquisition into an inspiring, sustainability-focused narrative of shared purpose and innovation that positions the brand for future growth.
For the website portion of the project, the team migrated seven websites with a total of 4,091 pages, and we continued to migrate sites after the brand refresh launch in July 2024. Our team also implemented 9,464 redirects and rebranded more than 35 website components. When completed, the site achieved a 96 Google Lighthouse performance score (out of 100). And since the first Diversey content launch in March 2024, solenis.com generated an increase of 400,000 monthly page views — that’s a remarkable 250% boost.
We rolled out deliverables, including:
• Planning, research & strategy
• Iconography updates
• Training
• Brand rollout planning
• Brand guidelines
• Brand-at-a-glance sheet
• Messaging playbook
• Brand PowerPoint template
• Brand spirit video
• Leadership event support
• Video bookends
• Social media brand rollout
• Public relations rollout support
• Social strategy
• Social media template audit
• Social media template build
• Project insight, planning & on-going support
• Technical insight, planning & on-going support
• Solenis website information architecture updates & content mapping
• Solenis website design (brand) refresh
• Website development updates & CMS training
• Diversey content migration support
• Cookies and privacy compliance integration
• Service and support integration
• Search implementation & support
• Diversey language sites migration support
9,464
Redirects
7
Websites rebranded
4,091
Web pages rebranded
35+
Rebranded website components
96
Google Lighthouse score
400K(250%)
Increase in monthly page views
- Branding
- Content Creation
- Data and Analytics
- Landing Pages and Microsites
- Research
- Strategy
- Video
- Campaign Planning
- Public Relations
- Social Media
- Identity and Logo Design
- Website Design and Development
- Search
- Internal Campaign
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