Zenia Rangwala

Greyhound · Brand identity and strategy · Student concept (GDVX 502, Big Brand Rebrand)

Rebranding the bus for the people who actually ride it

How can Greyhound keep its history and prices, but feel like a trip people actually want to take?

The Greyhound print-at-home ticket from Atlanta to New York next to two luggage tags, one white and one black reading “Peach to Apple”, on dark blue.
Role
Brand designer
Team
Solo student project

TL;DR

  • A student rebrand that keeps Greyhound's prices and its running dog, but turns the bus ride into a road trip people actually want to take.
  • Built around three riders: Aditi the student, Liam the solo traveller and Mariana, a mom travelling with her kids.
  • It ends in 13 components for one trip from Atlanta to New York, from a print-at-home ticket to colouring books, most of them reshaped by class critique.

The Greyhound we know

Greyhound started in 1914 in Minnesota as a small bus service, and Flix bought it in 2021. Its whole mission is affordable long-distance travel, getting people from one city to another.

The chrome dog and script wordmark are on everything, but the brand still feels old, grey and “cheap bus”.

The existing Greyhound brand: a dark blue poster with a silver chrome running-dog logo and script wordmark.
Where it started: the chrome dog and script wordmark.

Who rides

Real people with real budgets. Riders are mostly young adults (18–24) and seniors (65+) on low to middle incomes, and they need to travel long distances for cheap.

I built three personas from that, and they became my three target audiences:

  • Aditi, 21, a university student who needs a travel option that fits her budget and is easy to figure out.
  • Liam, 28, a solo traveller who wants the trip to feel easy and worth taking.
  • Mariana, 38, a mom who just wants travelling with her kids to feel simple and dependable.

The gap

Everyone else is selling a seat too. Megabus is cheaper because there are no stations, but you wait on the curb in any weather. Peter Pan is cleaner and more on time, but only on the East Coast. Amtrak is comfy with lots of legroom, but much more expensive.

What I noticed: nobody owns the experience of the ride. That was the gap.

My first SWOT had a lot of points. The one that stuck out was under Opportunities: turn the journey itself into part of the experience. That line ended up being the whole project.

The challenge

  • Old story: “Greyhound is the cheap way to get there.”
  • New story: “Greyhound lets you go somewhere.”

Affordable becomes accessible. Basic becomes spontaneous. Old becomes iconic. A bus ride becomes a road trip, and strangers become human connection.

The big idea: every journey has a story

Once I knew the problem, I looked for a feeling, and landed on the American road trip, the kind people daydream about.

Greyhound has been connecting people and places for over 100 years. My rebrand makes the journey just as meaningful as the destination: the places you see, the people you meet and the stories you take home.

My first campaign lines were “See what’s out there.”, “Good stories start somewhere.” and “There’s more to the journey.”

My first moodboard (sage greens, burnt orange, the chrome logo and a map) felt flat. Moving to open roads, desert, the coast, bus windows at sunset and Route 66 is where it clicked.

Identity

Colour, type and logo. Lots of versions, lots of feedback, and one rule I never broke: don’t change the dog.

Logo: same dog, three tries

  1. Try 1: the chrome dog on sunset backgrounds with italic type. It still looked like the old brand.
  2. Try 2: the dog in a blue-to-orange sunset gradient with a blue wordmark.
  3. Final: a cream dog and wordmark on Majestic Mountain Blue. Simpler, warmer, and it works on everything.
Logo try 1: four tiles with the chrome greyhound and italic Greyhound wordmark, on dark teal and on orange sunset backgrounds with leaf shadows.
Try 1: the chrome dog on sunsets.
Logo try 2: a running greyhound filled with a blue-to-orange gradient above a dark blue Greyhound wordmark, on cream.
Try 2: the gradient dog.

The final Greyhound 2.0 logo keeps the same running dog, redrawn in cream with a new wordmark, and the dog works on its own as an icon.

The final Greyhound 2.0 logo: a cream running greyhound above a cream Greyhound wordmark on Majestic Mountain Blue.
Final: cream on Majestic Mountain Blue.
The cream running greyhound on its own, on a Majestic Mountain Blue square.
The dog on its own, as an icon.

Type: finding a wordmark that moves

I tried italic and sporty sans serifs next to the old chrome script. The italics felt too fast and too much like a sports brand. I wanted something steady and wide, like a bus on the highway.

Eight Greyhound wordmark tests in italic and sporty sans serifs, next to the old chrome script logo.
Wordmark tests next to the old chrome script.

Final wordmark

Headings
Archivo Expanded SemiBold: wide and steady, and still friendly next to the dog.
Body
Inter, so everything is easy to read on tickets and phones.

Colour: five colours became a whole road trip

Version 1 had generic names, and Road Grey felt dull.

  • Heritage Blue #28576B
  • Sunset Orange #CA6B3F
  • Sand #EEDFC8
  • Sage Green #77836B
  • Road Grey #393B3A

I dropped Road Grey and renamed everything to follow a trip, from the overnight ride to the Georgia peach. Then I added a sunset gradient called The Long Way.

The final palette: Majestic Mountain Blue, Amber Wave White, Red-Eye Ride, Window Seat Dusk, Diner Booth, Gas Station Glow, Georgia Peach and Roadside Sage, with The Long Way sunset gradient running from dark blue through dusky purple to peach.
The final palette, with The Long Way gradient.

System

This is how the logo, photos and patterns work together, and it’s the part that changed the most after critique.

Picture and logo: part of the view

After: a desert highway at sunset with a bigger cream Greyhound logo sitting on the horizon.
After: a bigger logo on the road.
After: a neon “Arlington Diner” sign with just the cream greyhound flying above it.
After: just the dog, flying over the diner sign.

I made the logo bigger compared to the image, and stopped always showing the full lockup. Sometimes it’s just the dog.

Pattern: from leaf shadows to a symbol for every region

Soft leaf shadows were pretty, but they could be any brand. I tried speed signs, coffee mugs and setting suns next, then moved to symbols that say where you are, like peaches for Georgia or palm trees for California.

Before: leaf shadows falling across a cream background, with the gradient greyhound and blue Greyhound wordmark.
Before: leaf shadows.
A desert road at sunset with a row of speed limit signs counting up from 20 to 75 across the sky, and a small cream greyhound in the corner.
Next: speed signs along the road.
After: the final greyhound logo on blue, framed by a curving route of peaches that turn into apples.
After: peaches turning into apples along a route.
After: the final greyhound logo on burnt orange, surrounded by cowboy hats, boots, cacti and stars.
After: Texas boots, cacti and hats.
After: the greyhound logo on Majestic Mountain Blue between rows of small palm trees.
After: palms for the coast.

Picture and pattern: letting the pattern take over the photo

At first it was a leaf shadow on the road, and you could barely see the pattern. So I dropped the borders and side panels, put the pattern right on the photo, and made each region different.

Before: desert road photos with a faint leaf shadow across the road.
Before: you could barely see the pattern.
After: peaches rolling down a desert road at sunset, a checkerboard of coast symbols and photos, and Texas cut-outs filled with diner photography.
After: peaches rolling down the road, a checkerboard for the coast and Texas cut-outs over the diner.
A coastal street at sunset lined with palm trees, with palm-leaf shadows falling across the top of the photo.
The coast, with palm shadows over the photo.
Close-up of Texas pattern shapes, a star, cactus, boot and hats, filled with diner photography.
Texas cut-outs over the diner.

A symbol for every stop

I chose simple symbols for each region, then turned them into the patterns: peaches and palms for the Southeast, boots and cacti for Texas, surfboards and waves for the West Coast, apples and skylines for the Northeast, and pines and mountains for the Mountain states.

The symbol library in cream on blue: peach, apple, palm tree, wave, sun, surfboard, star, cowboy boot, cactus, cowboy hat, mountains, pine tree, lighthouse, city skyline and a bus.
The symbol library.

Directions explored: the ticket, three times

The ticket is the clearest example of how much the components changed.

Ticket version 1: a wide boarding-pass layout from ATL to NYC with a gradient header, seat 12C, gate 7 and a barcode stub.
1: a “Boarding Pass” with a gate number.

1. Boarding pass. My first ticket said “Boarding Pass” and “Gate 7”, which is airline language. It looked nice, but it’s a bus, not a plane: no gates, no boarding pass.

Ticket version 2: a black-and-white bus ticket from ATL to NYC with a tear-off stub, seat 14 and a QR code.
2: black and white, but shaped like a stub.

2. Stub. Black and white this time, so it would print on any home printer. But it was shaped like a stub, and nobody prints a stub.

Ticket version 3: a printable letter-size e-ticket from ATL to NYC with a QR code, a route timeline, a fold line, a “Before you go” checklist, a “Good to know” section and a “Your trip, mile by mile” section to fill in.
3 (final): a real letter-size page you'd print at home and keep.

3. Final. A real letter-size page with a fold line, a checklist and a “mile by mile” section to fill in. I kept going until it felt like something you’d print at home and keep.

Where the components started

My first set was a road card, a stamp card, a boarding pass and an Instagram post. Version 1 looked like an airline.

Version 1 “Road Card” with the Greyhound logo over a blue-to-orange gradient with leaf shadows.
v1 road card.
Version 1 stamp card: “Your 5th ride is on us”, with four greyhound stamps and a fifth circle marked “5th”.
v1 stamp card.
Version 1 Instagram post from Greyhound with the gradient logo on cream, shown on a phone.
v1 Instagram post.

The critique changed everything that came after:

  • It’s a bus, not a plane. No gates, no boarding pass.
  • Make the printed ticket real: black and white, letter size, something you’d actually print at home.
  • Fewer words and no fake drop shadows.
  • Add the brand voice to everything.
  • Think about the third audience: moms travelling with kids.

Final design: 13 components for one trip

This is everything a rider would hold, scan, hear or hang on their bag, told as one trip from Atlanta to New York.

A dark Greyhound coach parked on a road under a blue sky with clouds.
Greyhound: The Great American Road Trip.
  1. Print-at-home ticket
  2. Wallet pass
  3. Luggage tag
  4. Window Seat Guide
  5. Departure board
  6. Songs for the Long Way
  7. Stories from the Road
  8. Sleep kit
  9. Postcards
  10. Colouring books
  11. Road Trip Crayons
  12. Bus window decal
  13. Sticker sheet

Stop 1: Book it

Print it, fold it, don’t lose it. Or just keep it on your phone. The letter-size ticket above is the paper version, with a wallet pass for riders who’d rather not print.

Stop 2: “Let’s get out of here.”

A Greyhound departure board reading “Let's get out of here.”, listing departures to New York, Savannah, Nashville, Charlotte and Miami with bay numbers and statuses.
The departure board at the station says what everyone's thinking.

Stop 3: Tag your bag

Two Greyhound luggage tags, one white and one black reading “Peach to Apple”.
“Peach to Apple”, for the Atlanta to New York route.
A blue luggage tag with a name and route form on one side, and “Mountain Route” over a pine-forest photo on the other.
Mountain Route tag.

Stop 4: Find your window seat

A two-sided seat-back card. Front: “What you'll pass today”, a timeline from Atlanta at 6:30 PM through Charlotte, Richmond, Washington DC, the Susquehanna River and Philadelphia to New York at 12:55 PM, about 870 miles and 9 states. Back: “Make yourself at home.” with free Wi-Fi, power, seatbelts, emergency exits, restroom and quiet hours.
The Window Seat Guide: what you'll pass today, and how to make yourself at home.

Stop 5: Press play

A phone playing “Songs for the Long Way”, an ATL to NYC route mix of nine songs from Midnight Train to Georgia to Empire State of Mind, next to its peach-to-blue cover art.
Songs for the Long Way: one song for every state on the route.
A dark app screen titled “Stories from the Road” with a list of short episodes.
Stories from the Road: one short story for every state line you cross.

Along the way

A two-sided Northeast region card: a blue front with greyhound stamps and a progress circle, and a back with “Northeast” over a photo with leaf shadows and a barcode.
Northeast region card, front and back.
Greyhound postcards: “Hello from the Pacific.” over a coastal photo, “Greetings from the Coast” with photos inside the letters, and a back reading “Sent from Seat 14. 2,000+ miles of road. One window seat. Zero regrets.” with a greyhound stamp.
Postcards, “Sent from Seat 14.”
A postcard front: a desert highway at sunset under a dramatic sky, with a small cream Greyhound logo in the corner.
Postcard: the open road.
Three “Are We There Yet?” kids' colouring books: The Northeast (New York to Maine) in blue with an apple and skyline, The Southeast (Georgia to Florida) in peach with a peach and palm tree, and The Mountains (Colorado, Utah, Montana) in sage with mountains, a pine and a bus.
“Are We There Yet?” colouring books, one per region.
A colouring book spread: “Colour the peach!” with a peach outline, and “Spot it out the window” with a checklist of things to find.
Inside: colour the peach, then spot things out the window.

Outcome and reflection

The tagline I ended on: the journey is part of the destination.

  • Keep what works. The dog was the strongest thing Greyhound had. Not touching it made every other change easier to trust.
  • Specific beats pretty. Leaf shadows were nice, but peaches, boots and palm trees tell you where you are.
  • Feedback made it real. Most of my best moves came from critique: the paper ticket, the overlays, the brand voice and the colouring books.

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