Recently I was asked about the history of the name and branding of Newfrontiers. Those decisions and changes I was involved with occurred between 1980-2011.
1980 – Coastlands. This was intended to refer to the verse in Is 41 where ‘Coastlands’ implies the ends of the earth. However, many interpreted it as the south coast where Terry was then based so a change was needed.
1986 – New Frontiers. Although not a Biblical term this expressed our heart to reach the ends of the earth.
1986 – New Frontiers International (NFI). ‘International’ was added quite quickly to emphasise the international nature of the vision.
2002 – Newfrontiers. This rebranding came after the Stoneleigh Bible Week closed. The name was created to make it deliberately more difficult to translate, ‘Frontiers’ in some languages implying ‘boundaries’ or ‘limitations’. The colours of the branding also changed as red, white and blue are predominantly ‘northern hemisphere’ colours. So we used red, green and gold, green and gold being colours commonly associated with the southern hemisphere, thus reflecting the global nature of the Newfrontiers vision and family.
Since 2011 there has been a further change of logo, but I am not aware of the thinking behind it.
Other history
For those who want to trace some of our history you may like to explore past postings of this blog using the search bar above. But hurry! I will soon be taking it offline and transferring it as an archive to the Research Centre at Regents Theological College in Malvern, UK, where archives of the Pentecostal and Charismatic movements in the UK are held. This now includes the Newfrontiers archives, but they are available only for research purposes.