Rachel Zsembery, President & CEO, Bergmeyer
Invest: spoke with Rachel Zsembery, president and CEO of Bergmeyer about how the firm is supporting clients beyond design, with expertise in brand identity and a passion for connecting with the community. “If there is a way that we can bring all of that under one umbrella to make the process easier for our client, it’s a huge win for us,” she said.
What have been your key takeaways from the past year?
A topic of priority for us as a business this past year has been strategic growth. 2025 will mark the 50th anniversary of the firm and we’ve expanded in many ways, in terms of the market sectors we serve, leadership team and structure, and overall growth in size across all three offices. We’re focused on setting up a foundation for durable resiliency for the next fifty years. We practice across a range of services, including architecture, interior design, brand identity, strategy and environmental graphic design. We have paired these services to support unique opportunities across many of our markets, including full-service asset repositioning from brand identity through architectural and interior design. Our wellness clients are also seeing the importance of investing in our full suite of services to allow their patient base to connect to their brand in a more authentic and meaningful way.
We feel fortunate that many of the markets we serve continue to be strong, even in what many might still term an uncertain economy. These strong markets include retail, food and beverage, hospitality, wellness and higher education. We also became a Massachusetts Benefit Corporation this year, which is a corporate designation that is quite significant to us. It demonstrates the measurable impact we have created for society and the environment by addressing the climate crisis, providing opportunities for young people from underserved communities in design, supporting organizations that advance social justice, and strengthening our communities by using our influence as a business for good.
How is Bergmeyer providing positive impacts for the environment?
One of our strongest values is to practice with a strong sense of purpose. We evolved our corporate structure to demonstrate internally and externally how deep our commitment to practicing with purpose lies. It has allowed us to reflect on our client mix and how they’re supporting communities, the types of partners we collaborate with, and how their corporate values align with ours. We have solidified our commitment to climate resiliency and sustainable design. In the past year, we’ve launched a partnership and consultancy service called Bergmeyer+ in partnership with sustainability visionary Annie Bevan and her team at Parallel, helping retailers align their overarching purpose and mission with their corporate sustainability goals in store environments.to make a positive difference in the world through sustainable design.
While we practice across a wide range of markets, this happens to address a specialty niche within retail market. Many of our retail clients have set ambitious and laudable corporate sustainability commitments. However, when we evaluate what’s being produced in retail store environments, there is a monumental opportunity to close the gap from where retailers are today and meaningful progress towards meeting corporate sustainability commitments.
How does Bergmeyer engage with the community?
We have several different programs that we sponsor, including various scholarship opportunities. We love partnering with non-profit organizations with whom we have an affinity and shared values to deliver many of these scholarship and mentorship programs. We’ve had a years-long partnership with the Hip Hop Architecture Camp which includes a scholarship and internship experience each year, offering each year’s recipient the opportunity to not only receive financial assistance towards their college tuition, but also providing them a first-hand experience to immerse themselves within our design office and collaborative culture through a mentorship opportunity. We have been working with the Boston Private Industry Council for several years and have brought in a number of interns from the Boston Public School system every summer. providing students an opportunity to explore the process of creating design solutions for a diversity of communities and users. We also engage in pro bono work and love finding opportunities to work with companies in our community that may not even know where to start in the complex process of design. They’re looking for ways to get their project off the ground, and we can help them express their unique identity and create solutions to better serve the users of their spaces.
What are some of the innovative industries that Bergmeyer is working with today?
In the advanced technology space, we’re seeing a lot of new and expanding companies in the market with robotics and alternate fuel transportation technology. Many of these tech companies have an interesting mix of needs. In addition to the design of their traditional office spaces, they also have R&D lab and light industrial physical needs which is a complex spatial challenge – and one that we have a great deal of experience in solving for. We develop spaces that support this full range of needs in a way that is flexible and adaptable as they continue to scale and grow, whether it’s through organic growth, acquisition of aligned companies, or the development of new products and services.
How is the firm applying technology like AI into projects?
Like many architecture and design agencies, we’ve looked at how we can leverage innovative technology such as AI for our clients’ and teams’ advantage. Any time we integrate a new technology into our process, we think about how the process can reduce friction for our client, whether it’s the length of time for a project phase, or even increasing the sense of co-creation with our partnerships. We seek to find tools that leverage opportunities for our clients to become part of the creative process. That’s where we are finding a real opportunity to leverage AI technology as a supportive tool that elevates our human-centric approach to design.
What are your goals as you continue developing new partnerships?
Our top goal is to make the design and project development process less cumbersome for our clients. One of the reasons we expanded into the number of markets that we have and established more strategic partnerships is because there is such a plethora of partners in any given project. We’re all feeling the pinch of how much we’re juggling at one time, so if process improvement through creating a more comprehensive and streamlined suite of end-to-end design services is something we can support our clients with, a win for their team is a win for us.
