STANLEY Security Acquisition: Building the Narrative for a New Global Brand

The $3.2 billion acquisition of STANLEY Security created many opportunities for me to spread my wings professionally. While it was an incredibly challenging journey, it offered me the chance not only to lead all external communication planning for a historic acquisition, but also to flex my brand storytelling muscles.

As part of the acquisition, STANLEY Security and Securitas Electronic Security were coming together as a new brand: Securitas Technology. Launching a new brand meant we needed to develop a narrative that seamlessly combined the rich history and legacy of both businesses, while also reflecting our collective ambitions for the future.

In theory, it was simple: honor the past and reach for the future. In practice, it was much more difficult to define and creatively articulate who we are and, most importantly, agree on it as a company.

To better understand our unique selling proposition, I joined key stakeholders in two different brand workshops in 2022 – one at the Securitas Electronic Security headquarters in Uniontown, Ohio, and one at the Securitas corporate headquarters in Stockholm, Sweden.

In Uniontown, I toured the Technology Evaluation Lab and Client Engagement Center, while learning more about the company’s technician training program. This visit helped me more effectively write content for the Careers, Engineering Center of Excellence and Technology Innovation webpages.

In Stockholm, I joined more than a dozen marketing leaders from nine countries for a strategic brand and communications summit to collaborate on the brand architecture, value proposition, go-to-market strategy and more.

These workshops were instrumental in helping me create a brand message map and later write much of our foundational brand content, including our new boilerplate, as well as our About Us and Why Securitas Technology? webpages.

Brand Message Map:

Final Boilerplate: Securitas Technology, part of Securitas, is a world-leading provider of integrated security solutions that protect, connect and optimize businesses of all types and sizes. More than 13,000 colleagues in 40 countries are focused daily on our purpose to help make your world a safer place and our commitment to deliver an unparalleled client experience. With clients at the heart of all we do, our people, knowledge and technology power our connected ecosystem of health, safety and security solutions and services. To learn more, visit securitastechnology.com.

While workshops gave me a 50,000-foot view of the new brand, one-on-one interviews with experts helped me articulate our story around concrete offerings like the new Global Clients Program.

With each piece of content I wrote, getting approvals from stakeholders across the company took careful consideration and required that I meticulously absorb feedback and direction from multiple sources, including the global president, our legal team, Securitas Group and others who each had their own opinion about how to tell our brand story.

Even with all the hurdles I faced, I’m grateful I had the rare opportunity to build the narrative for a powerful new brand that will undoubtedly contribute positively to the global community. I’m also incredibly proud that I continue to be invited to the table for my insights and expertise – and that I can consistently showcase my brand storytelling skills.