Brand Story: Spencer Trail Signs

Case Study:
Spencer Mountain Trail Signage and Map

Deliverables:
+Creative Direction
+Copy Writing
+Signage Design
+Trail Map Design
+Project Management

Background:
A large network of mountain bike trails has existed for years on Spencer Mountain, just west of Whitefish. Although technically illegal, these trails were frequented by Whitefish residents and visitors looking for challenging freeride trails close to town. These trails were located on State Trust lands and were scheduled for logging beginning in 2014. Instead of standing by and watching the trails get destroyed, The City of Whitefish, Flathead Fat Tires, and Whitefish Legacy Partners worked together toward legitimizing the trails and ensuring that they will stay open and be properly maintained for years to come.

Challenge:
In order to receive a designation as official public trails, signage and maps needed to be created and placed at trailheads and key intersections to help users navigate the trails. For this step, Wheelie Creative was contracted to work with the overseeing organizations to make legal biking at Spencer a reality. Additionally, free ride trails should not be dorky, so the signs needed to be informative without feeling pedantic.

Approach:
It’s no secret that the trails at Spencer Mountain are near and dear to the hearts of the Wheelie crew. Using our intimate knowledge of the area, we were able to anticipate the unique challenges that this project presented.

Since these trails will receive overflow cyclists from the nearby Whitefish Trail network, which skews toward entry to intermediate-level riding, additional care needed to be taken to ensure that users were aware of the difficulty and variety of obstacles on the trails prior to embarking. To achieve this, we utilized a fun, hand-drawn style in adding elements to the signage that would present the information to users without giving off a stuffy appearance. This resulted in designs that aligned well with the typical users of the trail while drawing their attention to present information in a clear and lively way.

The map portion of the project had to integrate seamlessly with the maps produced for The Whitefish Trail while still maintaining a designation of “freeride-specific” trails since this would be added to the existing map created for The Whitefish Trail.

​This was accomplished by creating differentiating marks to add to the map calling out “Spencer Trails” as a freeride playground while not making it appear so harsh as to keep riders away. This project required coordinating with multiple groups overseeing the project including the Flathead Fat Tires, The City of Whitefish and Whitefish Legacy Partners.

Results:
The trails at Spencer Mountain, complete with maps and signage, officially opened to the public in July 2015. Wheelie was on hand at the Grand Opening with a photo booth set up to capture the monumental stoke of longtime riders of the mountain accessing the trails legally for the first time. Everyone was thrilled that they could count on their favorite freeride playground existing to see another day.

In Their Words:
“Wheelie was great to work with and the signs perfectly encompass the look and feel we wanted to accomplish with the entire trail system at Spencer.”
​Erin Bodman, President of the Flathead Fat Tires