Small businesses and freelancers rarely have a brand team to answer every question, so the brand drifts: a stretched logo here, an off-shade green there. This brand style guide template puts the decisions in one short document: the brand story, logo rules, color values, fonts, imagery, voice and who approves exceptions. Each rule comes with the reason it exists, so people follow it instead of working around it.

The sample follows Elmstead Collective, a fictional neighborhood goods co-op, with a 24 mm minimum logo width, HEX, RGB and CMYK values for every color, two typefaces in six sizes, a 60/40 people-to-place photo ratio and three voice traits with before-and-after lines. Replace the logo, swatches and photos with your own, rewrite the voice examples, and add your approval email and turnaround time.