Want to interview a Grady Britton team member or have a press opportunity to feature our work?

Media Inquiries

Progress doesn’t sit still _here._

Blog • Agency News & Thought Leadership

<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/media/Announcement_Animation_WIP_ab667d5f7b.gif" alt=""></figure>We couldn’t be more excited to announce that our agency’s mission just got even more real.&nbsp;The headline-worthy news is this: Grady Britton is joining forces with fellow B Corp and Portland agency, Mad Fish Digital. Two values-led, mission-oriented brand and marketing companies united — with perfectly complementary skills and heart — as Mad Fish acquires Grady Britton.&nbsp;For clients, the true end-to-end possibilities are officially off the charts. GB’s brand development and expression, rounded out with Mad Fish’s robust, applied digital expertise — native digital strategy, SEO, SEM, measurement, analytics, etc. For the cultures of both agencies, an injection of talented people, inspired professionals at the tops of their game.&nbsp;“The talent and work that has been created at Grady Britton is second to none for thoughtfulness, innovation, impact, and creativity,” says Mad Fish CEO Ben Herman. “From our perspective, combining Mad Fish and Grady Britton, an agency of people also committed to making real change with their work, has the greatest potential for savvy clients to make lasting impact in their categories. Our business approaches align unusually well and has us confident and excited about the rewarding work this union will inspire for our collective teams, clients and communities.”With Mad Fish and Grady Britton combining under the ownership of Corrie and Ben Herman, our agencies will operate as strategic partners in the near term with Paige Campbell staying in the role of President at Grady Britton, and Andy Askren as Creative Director. The acquisition will bring together a combined team of 47 people distributed over 10 states and headquartered in Portland.Both agencies are certified B Corporations, sharing a commitment to the triple bottom line that values people, planet, and profit. Grady Britton was the first Portland creative agency to be certified in 2015, with Mad Fish following in 2018.We’re happy to say that Grady Britton continues on — everything we currently do, we’ll keep doing. Mad Fish will be moving business forward on their end. We’ll meet in the middle where it makes sense to; we’ll collaborate when it's called for.&nbsp;&nbsp;Now more than ever, our agency is poised to do good on an even greater scale. Thanks for joining us.

Leaving Today Better Than Yesterday… In a Bigger Way. 

We’re all feeling the uncertainty that comes with an economic downturn. These days the state of the economy can make you dizzy, depending on which headlines you read. But one thing is for certain - whether we’re in a recession or not, the state of uncertainty is causing a shift in the choices brands are making when it comes to precious dollars spent.&nbsp;&nbsp;Today, return on investment is king. And with rumors of recession, inflationary pressures, and mass layoffs, many organizations are cutting back on discretionary spending: CMOs are being asked to do more with less, resulting in budgets that are dedicated to traditional demand generation and conversion tactics.With the increased uncertainty and pressure to deliver, CMOs may be looking to cut investment in what has been a heavy focus for so many brands over the past couple of years; brand purpose. And, while current economic conditions make it easy to understand the inclination to put this investment on the chopping block, done right it’s brand purpose that can help drive the bottom line in both the long term and the short term.&nbsp;What do consumers value and need right now?&nbsp;During recessions and economic downturns, consumers are in a 'need' mentality rather than a 'want' mentality; actively trading down, holding on to things longer, and scaling back. In this mindset, they're scrutinizing the value they will receive from a brand, particularly when a brand is not offering the lowest price. This is a different kind of scrutiny than is typically placed on brand purpose. One that goes beyond backing up a brand’s statements with action, but also connecting purpose tangibly to customers needs in the moment. In short, customers are looking at purpose through a different lens - not only the 'Is this doing right by the world?' lens, but also the 'What's in it for me?' lens.During recessionary periods, consumers are more willing to buy from brands that offer the following tangible benefits:1. Superior quality products&nbsp;2. Products that directly support their long term goals&nbsp;3. Brands that provide greater reward for their loyalty&nbsp;When consumers are in this mindset, the question CMO’s should ask themselves isn’t “Should we continue to invest in brand purpose,?” but instead “Are we connecting our brand purpose to tangible benefits that consumers are seeking at this moment?”Companies like Stumptown and Bob’s Red Mill are great examples of brands that place their purpose front and center in both tangible and meaningful ways.&nbsp;Stumptown, a pioneer of the Direct Trade sourcing model with coffee producers, provides strong, stable prices and long-term relationships to producers, ensuring their ability to invest in the future of their families, farms, and business. This isn't just an effort to do better by the thousands of people who produce their coffee; these long-lasting partnerships translate into a better tasting cup of coffee than you can buy anywhere else.Bob’s Red Mill is a company known for taking care of its people, with a longstanding history of giving back to communities. Rather than sell to the highest bidder, the business was turned over to its employees. This commitment to taking care of folks also ensures they can stay focused on their commitment to providing healthy foods to the world.&nbsp; For a customer, this equates to hundreds of products in numerous categories that people can depend on to support their wholesome lifestyle day in, day out.In a lot of ways, recessions underscore that brand purpose matters a lot. Consumers still want to choose companies who are driven by shared purpose and values that impact the world around them, but they also want to feel that impact in their own lives. So, rather than shift focus from purpose to product, the real power lies in pulling purpose through your product - giving customers the value they seek to better drive the bottom line, and making your limited marketing dollars pull double duty.Lizzie Hanner is Director of Strategy at Portland-based Grady Britton. With a never-ending curiosity in consumers, culture, and categories, Lizzie helps businesses solve problems that drive the bottom line while providing value and impact for the people and communities they serve. She’s spent over 15 years leading brand, campaign, and content strategies across agencies like Wieden &amp; Kennedy, Anomaly, and AKQA, as well as in-house for global non-profit Mercy Corps. She can be reached at LizzieH@gradybritton.com.

Keeping Brand Purpose Powerful In Economic Uncertainty

&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/media/GB_2023_Grant_blog_7918557810.png" alt=""></figure>&nbsp;It's our favorite time of year! We're excited to announce that today applications to our 12th annual grant program are now open. Local nonprofit organizations are invited to apply for $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding expertise, and/or 150 volunteer hours, provided by our Griffs.&nbsp;We recognize that some of Portland’s most impactful organizations do not have the resources to partner with a creative agency long-term. So for 12 years, we've offered $25,000 worth of internal time, to be applied to in-house services including branding, creative development, media planning/buying, public relations or any of our other services. The nonprofit organization must also have a marketing budget equal to at least $25,000 cash (to be used for outside costs or media) already in place to match Grady Britton’s in-kind services for a total $50,000 investment.After also offering volunteer hours for the first time in 2020, we're once again providing 150 volunteer hours to a nonprofit organization serving the greater Portland area. These hours can be applied to organizational needs, as they relate to typical volunteer activities.&nbsp;“Portland has so many generous, impassioned nonprofits dedicated to bettering our city,” says Paige Campbell, GB President.&nbsp;Organizations can apply to one or both grants online at&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/grant">gradybritton.com/grant</a>. Applications are due Wednesday, May 3 at 6 p.m. PST.&nbsp;The winner(s) of this year’s grant will join a group of past winners that include&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/blog/grady-britton-awards-2021-marketing-grant-to-meso">Micro Enterprise Services of Oregon</a>,&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/blog/grady-britton-awards-2021-volunteer-grant-to-brown-hope">Brown Hope</a>,&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/blog/feeding-love-a-year-volunteering-with-transition-projects">Transition Projects</a>,&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-brittons-grant-winner-artists-repertory-theatre-is-ready-for-its-debut">Artists Repertory Theatre</a>,&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-grants-friends-of-the-columbia-gorge-a-fresh-brand">Friends of the Columbia Gorge</a>,&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.mowp.org/">Meals on Wheels People</a>,&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://smartreading.org/">S.M.A.R.T</a>,&nbsp;<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.communitywarehouse.org/">Community Warehouse</a>&nbsp;and others.Please share this news with any organization you feel could benefit. We look forward to beginning our application review process on May 3<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/grant">APPLY NOW</a>

Grady Britton 2023 Grant Applications Now Open

<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/media/23_GB_B_Corp_Month_Post1_Still_Blog_8153d15525.png"></figure>&nbsp;Consider, for a minute, just how many businesses of all kinds are out there. With even more opening all the time. Each one catering to every possible need, every possible customer, in every possible way. It’s endless.&nbsp;If only there were a way to quickly tell which companies were in it for the right reasons? A sign – to make it easier to choose which ones you want to run with. And just like that, there is: the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.bcorporation.net/en-us/">Certified B Corp</a> badge.&nbsp;You’ve probably heard about benefit corporations. B Lab, a nonprofit that certifies companies as B Corps, “leads the movement built on the simple fact that business impacts and serves more than just shareholders — it has an equal responsibility to the community and to the planet,” explains Rose Marcario, former CEO, Patagonia.&nbsp;Grady Britton’s agency mission, “Leave today better than yesterday,” is all about incremental and constant improvement in everything we do, everyone our business touches. It aligned naturally with the B Corp ethos and we became certified in 2015.&nbsp;I won’t spoil the fun (errr, the work) ahead for any company diving in for their first certification. Let’s just say it’s comprehensive. It very thoroughly examines where and how your company goes beyond the norm, beyond what’s expected for an otherwise “successful” enterprise.&nbsp;This kind of examination keeps your company on target – true to your mission – as challenging as it can be. Which is good practice to be in anyway.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/media/23_GB_B_Corp_Month_Post2_Still_Blog_1_038e3b53fe.png"></figure>&nbsp;“So you’re a B Corp. So you’re perfect, right?” Lol, it would be wonderful if it went like that.No matter how good your intentions, you can – and likely will – get dragged for something, somewhere, sometime. Maybe you will even drag yourself (good job on doing that in advance, btw.) That’s not a bad thing. As with any change or improvement, it takes self-reflection (mission-reflection?) and ongoing attention and work. Find your courage, feel your flow, and embrace it.&nbsp;When Grady Britton was first certified in 2015, our score was 81.5. When we were recertified (and yes, it gets harder) in 2017, we scored 92.5. In 2022, GB earned recertification with our highest score yet of 102.5. So the work works. And if you like data, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.bcorporation.net/en-us/find-a-b-corp/company/grady-britton">check out our B Impact scorecard here</a>.&nbsp;A B Corp certification simply acknowledges that you’re going beyond. That you’re committed to doing business with a broader lens on who and what your business is affecting – internally within your organization and externally out in your community and the world. You’re part of a collective progress toward Better. Good job, you!&nbsp;As Madeleine Albright, former U.S. Secretary of State put it, “I often wonder to what extent business can help society in its goals and alleviate poverty, preserve ecosystems, and build strong communities and institutions... B Lab has proven that there is a way.”&nbsp;Simply put, do what you do, and do it really well. And then go beyond. It’s kind of the only way to go.&nbsp;&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/media/23_GB_B_Corp_Month_Post3_Still_Blog_89c4d72488.png"></figure>&nbsp;“Going beyond” can look like a lot of things. In fact, it will look like a lot of things. Just as it should.&nbsp;For Grady Britton, we look at all sorts of internal processes to improve our agency and ourselves – from physical office space (do we need all of it?), utilities, and resource conservation, to ongoing cultural examinations around HR practices, DEI training and learning, to name just a few.&nbsp;Swinging that same lens outward, to positively impact our community, is every bit as vital to us. It just so happens that our annual <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/grant">GB Grant</a> will also be going live soon.&nbsp;Now in its 12th year, the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/grant">GB Grant </a>is a very tangible example of how we put our talents and our mission to work – to Leave Today Better Than Yesterday where we live. Each year, we invite local nonprofit organizations to apply for $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding expertise, and/or 150 volunteer hours, provided by our Griffs. <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/grant">See some of our past winners here.</a>&nbsp;Do you need to be a B Corp to do these things? To go beyond? Absolutely not. More and more businesses are recognizing the interconnectedness of what they do and who they affect in their daily operations. So in a way, becoming a certified B Corp is your reward; a way of proclaiming to the world – to your current employees and shareholders, your future hires and partners – that you’re already Going Beyond. And now you’ve got proof.&nbsp;We’ll see you out there. xoxox, GB

GOING BEYOND, BECAUSE.

&nbsp;<figure class="image image-style-align-center"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/media/pearl_hero_3462aae90f.jpg" alt=""><figcaption>Photo Credit: Nick Simonite</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;A big welcome to our agency’s newest client. San Antonio’s <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://atpearl.com/">Historic Pearl</a> has tapped Grady Britton as its new PR agency of record to drive strategic communications for the organization.Since 2001, Pearl has been a significant catalyst for innovation and economic growth in San Antonio and continues to serve as a premier cultural, food and shopping destination.&nbsp; Our work together will place focus on Pearl’s deeper impact in hospitality, sustainability and community engagement.&nbsp;“Like Grady Britton, Pearl is a mission-driven organization with a commitment to the San Antonio community and beyond,” said Pearl Chief Marketing Officer Michael Joergensen. “We were impressed with their track record and experience in leading meaningful work with purpose-driven brands and look forward to our partnership.”“It takes a tremendous amount of creative energy and people power to innovate the way Pearl has so masterfully done, and we are proud to partner with them and place focus on Pearl’s people, impact and purpose as a leading authority in hospitality and major economic contributor to the region,” said Paige Campbell, president of Grady Britton.

Grady Britton named Public Relations AOR for San Antonio’s Historic Pearl

Purpose-driven brands are winning hearts and minds across generational divides. Why? Because their work is tangible, meaningful, and real – it matters at the everyday, human level – especially now when times feel uncertain.&nbsp;In today’s social, political and economic climate, consumers are wary. They are more discerning than ever about what their dollars are supporting. Their instincts are to spend less and tighten belts. Research and experience is showing us that consumers are choosing to do business with brands who are constant in their brand values, stand for them, day in, day out, – steadfast in their transparency, empathy, and corporate character.&nbsp;Erin Reilly, chief social impact officer at <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://twilio.org/">Twilio.org</a> shared with <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90798670/how-to-win-brand-loyalty-amidst-a-torrent-of-marketing-noise?utm_source=newsletters&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;leadId=935968&amp;mkt_tok=NjEwLUxFRS04NzIAAAGG6m6yV8toqR5JuF3AUmwT2sPRezH6oqu8jTXxQGviJVab0YTcYZxQjmrrVsljP-6AO1sSrvkYzWrT7OUlGw06UCD_6migFU6utujNDA">Fast Company</a>, “The need for social good and corporate social responsibility (or CSR) programs actually skyrockets when belts tighten. Those programs often serve the people most impacted by tough economic times, who could use even more support. So how can social impact leaders preserve their programs through thick and thin? By aligning what they do with the core business activity. In other words, by generating revenue—and even profit—that contributes to the bottom line.”A great example of a company with multiple bottom lines is Patagonia, which recently won the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://sustonmagazine.com/2022/10/26/patagonia-awarded-2022-fabric-of-life-award/">2022 Fabric of Life Award</a> for its nearly 50 years of “breaking barriers” in both products and responsibility. A long standing Certified B Corporation, Patagonia has been steadfast in communicating its values to the world through its actions, its partnerships and how it ultimately impacts the planet -- and they’ve been doing this for nearly 50 years.&nbsp;On a much, much different level, Grady Britton client First Interstate Bank’s service to the community has also been at the core of its business for over 50 years. In partnership with the First Interstate BancSystem Foundation, First Interstate awarded $1 million in grants as part of its <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.firstinterstatebank.com/believeinlocal#:~:text=Inaugural%20Believe%20in%20Local%20Campaign,our%20Believe%20in%20Local%20campaign">Believe in Local</a> campaign. An impressive display of their values, and proof that good comes in all shapes, sizes, and amounts.&nbsp;&nbsp;These mission-driven companies and countless others have created a movement and are becoming the rule -- not the exception. They are affecting real business change and are highly successful - by capitalism standards - yet doing work that has both human and environmental impacts with less standardized metrics to them. This is work that cannot be faked, but it can certainly be felt. Let’s call it “work with lasting worth.”&nbsp;The<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.ipsos.com/en-us/knowledge/society/reputation-council-report-2022#:~:text=The%20latest%20Ipsos'%20Reputation%20Council,the%20lingering%20impact%20of%20COVID."> IPSOS 2022 Reputation Council</a> found that many brands and organizations are struggling with a lack of standardization when it comes to increasingly important (and visible) environment, social and corporate governance (ESG) markers guiding their companies’ behaviors.&nbsp;&nbsp;The question is: can those standards become less “subjective” – more real and equally valued as traditionally accepted sales and marketing principles are? Can this growing movement create an accepted metric or margin? Will established companies adopt them? Will new companies simply start with them as their norm? I think that many are well on their way.&nbsp;Company and brand leaders are invited to self-reflect on your missions - your “Why” - how you partner, how you measure success and create impact. Is your brand mission in use? Is it tangible to the people who need to feel it, live it, engage with it in good times and in bad? And can you measure your impact?&nbsp;If you’re struggling with this existential question - believe it or not - you’re already doing the work by asking yourself these questions in the first place. But don’t stop there - there is a network of B Corporations, and like-minded brands looking to spread their goodness, and help create a new standard of doing business with you. You don’t have to go it alone.&nbsp;

Is your brand’s mission measurable?  Affecting business change with a purpose-driven mindset 

Marketers will take almost any opportunity to draw attention to their brands. Holidays, rites of passage, celebrations of nearly every kind – we’re awash in The Season’s Best sales moments. Seems like there’s Never Been a Better Time to Buy practically every month.&nbsp;Which brings us to this month. Both Pride and our newest federally-recognized holiday, Juneteenth, are celebrated in June. And true to form, brands are making headlines for all the wrong reasons.&nbsp;Ready for Juneteenth? There’s Juneteenth Ice Cream from Walmart. Or there was –&nbsp;until a social media firestorm (rightfully) got it pulled from store shelves. Pride, for many brands, is largely limited to token rainbow logos and earnestly philosophical posts. All with July 4, the granddaddy of summer events, teasing its formidable red, white, and blue frenzy.&nbsp;Can we – for a minute – just not? Sales goals are one thing. Making meaningful, relevant, long-term connections with an audience (particularly one that’s “new” for you) is quite another. Understand the differences and you can win at both.&nbsp;A culture knows its own like no one else. Reaching anyone in it requires more than an adults-18-36-with-a-college-education lens. The subtleties of a shared story, based on background, history, and common experience, make it easy for a culture to know who (and what) is for real and who isn’t. Who will be invited in, even briefly, and who won’t. Who will be seen as an ally, and who won’t.&nbsp;For marketers today, recognizing a cultural holiday appropriately – authentically –&nbsp; involves unlearning a lot of traditional marketing’s best practices, or rather tendencies. (One of many even larger unlearnings society is grappling with right now.) Taking the focus off of “what’s in it for us” to “check out what’s going on around us.”&nbsp;For Juneteenth, instead of hyping a limited-time-special-edition-anything, it can look like a dedicated (and ongoing) effort supporting other businesses — Black-owned businesses, as local suppliers or partners and their missions — and magnifying what success can be for them. For Pride, can you interpret your brand’s mission in a way that allows you to participate with vs. sell to? Consider why the LGBTIQ community matters to you; share origin stories? Showcase triumphs? Challenge threats? There are many, many ways to show up with a relevant voice.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Transactions now require a greater investment behind their message; not just of strategy and metrics but of respect. Learning, understanding, really seeing with new eyes. So jump into it; do the same thing you’d do with any significant new project: tap subject matter experts. The people with lived-experience and knowledge you don’t get in books or blogs; let them lead you. Let them inform new processes, new definitions, whole new perspectives that challenge the “this is how we’ve always done it” mantra.&nbsp;&nbsp;Therein lies the change your marketing needs. And it may be the most valuable kind of marketing there’s ever been.&nbsp;

When Not Marketing is the Right Marketing

As Portland’s Original B-Corp Marketing Agency founded in 1974, Grady Britton is a values-based, full-service marketing agency. We partner with like-minded companies, driving their business purpose to their brand’s fullest potential. The world needs what good brands bring; we’re here to see the good companies win.In 2017 Grady Britton launched our DEI Team dedicated to making an impactful change toward enhancing diversity, achieving equity, and being inclusive. Since then we have added an A for access to our DEIA initiatives. Our Diversity, Equity, Inclusion &amp; Access (DEIA) Team, in partnership with organizational leadership, continues to develop and expand internal and external DEIA policies and initiatives that create measurable impact and allow the fabric of our agency to continue to evolve. We recognize that this process is never complete. It is a constant journey of listening, learning, and asking for guidance and help.&nbsp;ObjectivesIn evaluating our priorities and resources, we have identified areas where we can currently make the biggest impact. As a result, we are looking for an outside partner to help us assess our current approach, identify opportunities, and provide support in creating actionable and measurable change.&nbsp;Specifically, we have identified the following areas for impact in order of priority:<ol><li>An outside perspective to give us a realistic picture of our progress, as well as areas of opportunity within our current DEIA policies, initiatives, and plans.</li><li>We see the need to continue building and expanding our current recruiting, hiring, and retention policies and initiatives related to DEIA.</li><li>Finally, we see a need for further, ongoing DEIA training for our employees and our leadership team.</li></ol>We are searching for a partner who has proven experience in helping organizations in these areas. We anticipate there may be continued opportunities past these first priorities. The right partner will be able to understand our vision and help us continue to evolve.TimingWe are hoping to find our partner by April 15, 2022. Please provide a recommended timeline with your proposal.ConnectIf you’re interested in this opportunity, we’d love to hear from you! To help with your proposal we can share the work we’ve already done as well as our current status and plans in the development areas outlined above. Please contact <a href="mailto:joeyh@gradybrittion.com">joeyh@gradybrittion.com</a> for questions or to begin the process for consideration.&nbsp;

Grady Britton Launches DEIA Consultancy Search 

Grady Britton is thrilled to announce our new <a href="https://www.bizjournals.com/portland/potmsearch/detail/submission/6510074/Jen_Scott">Public Relations Director - Jen Scott.&nbsp;</a>Joining the Griffin family with over 20 years of agency and in-house experience in Public Relations and MarComm strategy, Jen will lead the agency’s Public Relations Department to deliver integrated services, expand into new capabilities and generate impactful results with clients and agency team members.&nbsp;“Jen’s depth of experience in integrated marketing and communications brings a well-rounded perspective to the role. Our clients will benefit from her creativity and her results-driven approach to public relations and we are looking forward to her contribution to our agency’s efforts in deepening our impact and bringing even greater strategy and value,” says Paige Campbell, president of Grady Britton.Before joining Grady Britton, Jen has led communications teams both in-house and within agencies for national brands, where she grew a wealth of experience in developing digital marketing, consumer engagement, and content strategy.“I have been fortunate in my career to work for several B Corps, and it’s this commitment to the values-led business that brought me to Grady Britton, Portland’s first Certified B Corp creative agency,” says Scott. “I’m looking forward to building on the success of this team and bringing clients a deep strategy and continued results.”&nbsp;Help us give a warm welcome to Jen Scott!

Grady Britton Welcomes New PR Director and B Corp Veteran, Jen Scott

After much anticipation, we welcome <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.bizjournals.com/portland/potmsearch/detail/submission/6505383/Chelsea_Vandiver">Chelsea Vandiver</a> as our new Group Creative Director! We are extremely ecstatic to have this talented creative leader whose work aligns with our values of making meaningful change, both for our clients and our employees.&nbsp;As Group Creative Director, she will be in charge of leading the agency’s creative vision and product, overseeing the creative and studio departments, and setting the strategic standard for all work. She will also be working closely with clients and our Griffs to provide direction, inspiration, and strategy in alignment with our vision.&nbsp;&nbsp;We always pride ourselves on empowering women in the workforce, including those in the agency’s top leadership roles. Chelsea will add to an already impressive women-led management team, with agency President Paige Campbell at the helm.&nbsp;“Chelsea brings such an impressive perspective to our group,” said Campbell. “With her deep brand development and engagement experience, and her amazing leadership, we’re extremely excited to have her on the team and to bring her brilliance to our work.”&nbsp;Integrating a robust 20+ years in design communications, Chelsea has been able to craft creative strategies around humanizing the design experience, reflecting the embodiment of our mantra of business as a force for good. Her unique approach and passion will further enhance our agency’s mission to do great work for companies with core values of doing good.&nbsp;“I am thrilled to be joining Portland’s first B Corp agency and one that is courageously dedicated to doing good work for purpose-driven brands,” said Vandiver. “I have tremendous respect for the culture and values of the firm and the trusted relationship that has been built with clients over the years.”&nbsp;In her previous roles at Ziba Designs, she led brand and customer experience initiatives for clients including AARP, FedEx, Target, Proctor &amp; Gamble, Danner, and New Seasons. She is also on the Board of Directors for Gamblin Paint and has served as a member of the Children’s Cancer Association Innovations Board.Join us once more to welcome this talented firebrand, Chelsea Vandiver, to the Grady Britton family!

Chelsea Vandiver Named Grady Britton’s New Group Creative Director 

New in <a href="https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/364484/5-reasons-to-keep-traditional-media-in-the-mix.html">MediaPost</a>: GB Senior Media Planner/Buyer, Andy Ehlen, writes about the advantages of integrated marketing campaigns as digital media tactics continue to become more popular.For the past year, digital has been steadily on the rise, even while creative and ad spending has been flat, cut or reduced immensely due to the pandemic. While digital media is a critical component of campaign strategies, traditional media tactics have its own unique strengths. There can be an argument to use one over the other, but in today’s media landscape, integrated is the way to go.Andy provides 5 strengths of traditional media when creating campaign strategies, insight into using integrated campaigns to increase engagement and impact on the targeted audience.

5 Reasons to Keep Traditional Media In The Mix

New in <a href="https://gdusa.com/blog/now-is-a-big-ideas-best-time">Graphic Design USA</a> (GDUSA) GB Partner and Creative Director, Andy Askren, writes about a creative agency’s most-treasured asset: The Big Idea. You know the one.&nbsp;In the article Andy shares how now is a second chance to make a first impression. Because audiences not only have fresh eyes, they also have a curiosity for perspectives that make sense, feel real, solid, and believable — optimistic, hopeful — as a way forward. It’s curiosity bordering on craving.He writes, “With consumers in a heightened state of this awareness and openness, now is the time for brands to be the best version of themselves they possibly can be. And this is where agencies excel. It is in fact, what they are here to do for their clients. Delivering a potent combination of perspective, insight and craft, an agency is often more free to tap into quickly shifting audience mindsets and cultural trends and position a brand mindfully, authentically amidst that. To set a Big Idea loose.”<a href="https://gdusa.com/blog/now-is-a-big-ideas-best-time">Read the full article (and have Andy’s poetic waxed on you) in GDUSA.</a>You can also read more about brands, by Andy, in <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/the-responsibility-of-building-responsible-brands">this piece</a>.

Video of finger pressing a button on a head and igniting lighting.

Now Is A Big Idea’s Best Time

In the 11th year of Grady Britton’s annual grant, we selected two local nonprofits to receive $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding expertise and 150 volunteer hours. <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-marketing-grant-to-meso">MESO</a> is this year’s marketing grant winner, and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-volunteer-grant-to-brown-hope">Brown Hope</a> is this year’s volunteer grant winner! Given the incredible organization we had the chance to speak with, we also want to recognize a few other candidates for this year’s grants, one of which is Equitable Giving Circle.<a href="https://www.equitablegivingcircle.org/">Equitable Giving Circle</a> started in March 2020, in response to the murder of George Floyd and the ongoing Black Lives Matter civil rights movement. The organization’s vision is to create easily accessible and equity-building opportunities across Portland’s Black, Indigenous, and People of Color communities. EGC aims to achieve this by combining network building opportunities and fund development, both revolving around economic equity.&nbsp;Through community engagement they have found the most integral issues to address through their projects in order to see immediate change. Since their start, Equitable Giving Circle has consistently served 3,000 people per week through their CSA program, partnered with 50 local businesses and organizations to support the BIPOC community and has paid over $200,000 to 50 different households to assist with rent. They’ve also raised more than $1.3 million, with every penny going toward accomplishing these goals.&nbsp;Equitable assistance for both stable housing and food security through their <a href="https://www.equitablegivingcircle.org/#csaprogram">Community Supported Agriculture and Housing Stability projects</a> is a critical component of their work, too. Especially in recognition of gentrification within Portland. Through the interview process we learned more about the importance of this program, especially as it provides access to fresh, local produce — unfortunately not always common through food-assistance programs.We wish we could have chosen more winners for our grant (as we do every year), but we encourage Portlanders and beyond to look into Equitable Giving Circle and how you can help. There are many ways to <a href="https://www.equitablegivingcircle.org/donate">donate</a> and give time.Read about our other 2021 grant candidates: <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-marketing-grant-candidate-stone-soup">Stone Soup</a>, <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-volunteer-grant-candidate-impact-nw">Impact NW</a> and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-volunteer-grant-candidate-portland-fruit-tree-project">Portland Fruit Tree Project</a>!Feature photo courtesy of Equitable Giving Circle.

Grady Britton Marketing Grant Candidate: Equitable Giving Circle 

In the 11th year of Grady Britton’s annual grant, we selected two local nonprofits to receive $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding expertise and 150 volunteer hours. <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-marketing-grant-to-meso">MESO</a> is this year’s marketing grant winner, and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-volunteer-grant-to-brown-hope">Brown Hope</a> is this year’s volunteer grant winner! Given the incredible organization we had the chance to speak with, we also want to recognize a few other candidates for this year’s grants, one of which is <a href="https://www.portlandfruit.org/">Portland Fruit Tree Project</a>.&nbsp;Portland Fruit Tree Project creates access to healthy food by gathering and providing neighborhoods with fruit trees, which also encourages that community to keep up those resources. It also helps decrease the amount of waste while creating a sustainable way to produce healthy foods in the area.The nonprofit started in 2006 under the name “Neighborhood Fruit Tree Project” due to the mass amount of fruit falling from the trees in North and Northeast Portland neighborhoods. Since then, it’s donated more than $535,000 worth of fruit to local food distributors, completed 820 harvesting events and welcomed more than 11,000 volunteers to the organization.&nbsp;Through their <a href="https://www.portlandfruit.org/programs">two programs</a> — Tree Care Services and Backyard Harvest — Portland Fruit Tree Project ultimately takes care of neighborhoods’ local ecology. From offering orchard care to teaching lessons for DIY, to all of their year-round harvests, the nonprofit is a steward to our local communities and their environments.&nbsp;To get involved, there are both <a href="https://www.portlandfruit.org/volunteer">volunteer</a> and <a href="https://secure.lglforms.com/form_engine/s/T4M9XhCgTgDxklUnvGFkBg">donation</a> opportunities available. You can volunteer as an individual or get a group and do it together, and the summer harvest sessions sound like a particularly fun way to do some good.&nbsp;While we’re bummed we couldn’t award grants to more organizations, we hope what you learn about them sparks a passion to support in ways you can. You can read more about our other grant candidates: <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-marketing-grant-candidate-stone-soup">Stone Soup</a>, <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-marketing-grant-candidate-equitable-giving-circle">Equitable Giving Circle</a> and<a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-volunteer-grant-candidate-impact-nw"> Impact NW</a>.

Apples in crate with Portland Fruit Tree Project bag

Grady Britton Volunteer Grant Candidate:  Portland Fruit Tree Project

In the 11th year of Grady Britton’s annual grant, we selected two local nonprofits to receive $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding expertise and 150 volunteer hours. <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-marketing-grant-to-meso">MESO</a> is this year’s marketing grant winner, and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-volunteer-grant-to-brown-hope">Brown Hope</a> is this year’s volunteer grant winner! Given the incredible organization we had the chance to speak with, we also want to recognize a few other candidates for this year’s grants, one of which is<a href="https://impactnw.org/"> Impact NW</a>.&nbsp;Impact NW was founded in 1966 with a mission to prevent homelessness by partnering with people as they navigate their journey to stability and opportunity.&nbsp;The nonprofit primarily focuses on individuals and families on the brink of falling into homelessness and works to stabilize them by offering services (rent, utility) and to strengthen them by offering job training, parenting support and opportunities for children.Impact NW has <a href="https://impactnw.org/programs/">six service</a> areas that contribute to helping upwards of 25,000 people each year: early childhood and family services, youth and family services, housing and safety net services, senior services, schools uniting neighbors (SUN) community schools, and slavic community services. It’s a holistic approach to not only serve people experiencing homelessness, but also those who are on the verge. They’ve become somewhat of a pillar in Portland after so many decades of dedicated service.To get involved with Impact NW, there are <a href="https://impactnw.org/how-to-help/">a few ways to</a> help — from financial and essential items donations, to so many volunteer opportunities year-round. We hope you’ll spend some time learning more.&nbsp;It’s always hard not choosing more grant winners, and you can read more about our other grant candidates: <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-marketing-grant-candidate-stone-soup">Stone Soup</a>, <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-marketing-grant-candidate-equitable-giving-circle">Equitable Giving Circle</a> and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-volunteer-grant-candidate-portland-fruit-tree-project">Portland Fruit Tree Project</a>.

Two children and two adults standing in front of van

Grady Britton Volunteer Grant Candidate: Impact NW

In the 11th year of Grady Britton’s annual grant, we selected two local nonprofits to receive $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding expertise and 150 volunteer hours. <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-marketing-grant-to-meso">MESO</a> is this year’s marketing grant winner, and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-volunteer-grant-to-brown-hope">Brown Hope</a> is this year’s volunteer grant winner! Given the incredible organization we had the chance to speak with, we also want to recognize a few other candidates for this year’s grants, one of which is Stone Soup.<a href="https://www.stonesouppdx.com/">Stone Soup</a> is a local non-profit food service training enterprise that provides hands-on culinary training and workforce development to individuals at risk of homelessness.&nbsp;Through Stone Soup, Rinot and Craig Gerard have developed <a href="https://www.stonesouppdx.com/our-programs">four </a>areas of focus to support the Portland community as part of a larger 12-week course. Participants learn culinary skills and customer service, and receive a robust professional development education. After finishing the 12-week program, all graduates enter the job placement network, which provides participants with opportunities for job interviews and job placements. At the end of 2020, 55% of Stone Soup participants secured full-time jobs after completing the program.Although Stone Soup started in 2019, the COVID-19 pandemic played a big role in the development of the business by providing opportunities to serve the Portland community on a more consistent basis. Altogether, Stone Soup has contributed more than 47,000 meals directly and raised upwards of $179,000 in grants and donations in 2020.While we wish we could have worked with everyone this year, we hope others will find inspiration in these nonprofits’ missions, too. Read more about <a href="https://www.stonesouppdx.com/helpout">how to </a>help Stone Soup, and learn more about our other grant candidates: <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-marketing-grant-candidate-equitable-giving-circle">Equitable Giving Circle</a>, <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-volunteer-grant-candidate-impact-nw">Impact NW</a> and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-volunteer-grant-candidate-portland-fruit-tree-project">Portland Fruit Tree Project</a>.&nbsp;Feature photo credit: Joshua Chang, Foundry 503

Grady Britton Marketing Grant Candidate: Stone Soup

In our <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-turns-45">11th year of awarding the Grady Britton marketing grant</a>, we’re excited to have selected a Portland nonprofit that has been working for our community since 2008. <a href="https://mesopdx.org/">Micro Enterprise Services of Oregon</a> (aka MESO) elevates entrepreneurship throughout the Portland area. Through access to capital, business planning, market research, individual development accounts, bookkeeping, classes, networking and mentoring services, they help small businesses get started and get growing. Quite simply, MESO was founded on a notion that “low-income individuals could achieve economic security through entrepreneurship.”Specifically, MESO’s mission is to elevate and empower historically excluded and under-resourced entrepreneurs, with the aim to build family wealth through small business ownership. Here are some statistics to illustrate: since 2009, MESO has placed 1,250 loans and disbursed $12M, 70% of which to women-owned businesses and more than 60% to minority-owned businesses; since MESO’s beginnings, the nonprofit has served nearly 10,000 businesses across their support services; during the COVID-19 pandemic, MESO has administered $16M through 4,618 grants to micro- and small-businesses, and provided free business workshops to 500 businesses throughout the community.Our 5-person committee was tasked with the nearly impossible decision of choosing one marketing grant winner out of all of the applicants. What stood out to the team about MESO is the critical importance of their mission of helping grow our community’s small businesses. By providing financial assistance and program support to these entrepreneurs, they’re helping set Portland up for economic success while giving these business owners opportunities to see their visions through and set the next generation up for goodness, too.&nbsp;&nbsp;We’ll soon be sharing more on the Grady Britton blog and social media channels about the other two organizations we spoke more deeply with, providing information on how you can help, too. Choosing one winner among Portland’s incredible, deserving nonprofits is...difficult, to say the least. That’s why we’re glad we get to have a new winner every year!From all of us at Grady Britton, thank you to every organization that spent precious time to apply and share your stories with us. Above all, thank you for your selfless service to our community.<a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-volunteer-grant-to-brown-hope">Be sure to read more about this year’s volunteer grant winner, Brown Hope</a>!&nbsp;

Illustration that says, "congrats to our 2021 marketing grant winner MESO."

Grady Britton Awards 2021 Marketing Grant to MESO

Good news is the best news. And we’re so excited to share that we’ve chosen <a href="https://www.brownhope.org/">Brown Hope</a> as our 2021 volunteer grant winner! This Portland nonprofit started in 2018, from founder Cameron Whitten’s sense of urgency to overcome the vicious cycle of wounding caused by historical trauma.&nbsp;In their own words, “Brown Hope is a community solution for racial justice, creating connection with Black, Brown, and Indigenous leaders through the heart, mind, and voice to inspire our collective healing.” Through the Portland nonprofit’s programs and services, they create intentional spaces, resources and funds to support Portland’s Black, Brown and Indigienous communities.&nbsp;On June 1, 2020, during a pandemic peak and the Black Lives Matter civil rights movement, they took their mission a step further and launched the <a href="https://www.brownhope.org/black-resilience-fund">Black Resilience Fund</a> in response to the murder of GeorgeFloyd, which has since raised more than $2.5M and funded more than $2.1 in immediate financial relief to Black Portlanders. This resource is in addition to their <a href="https://www.brownhope.org/powerhour">Power Hour</a> (a place for people to build community and heal from the impacts of racism), <a href="https://www.brownhope.org/blackstreet-bakery">Blackstreet Bakery</a> (an economic development program), <a href="https://www.brownhope.org/equity-beyond">Equity &amp; Beyond</a> (a multi-week, dynamic learning experience that leverages a cohort model to address racial inequality), and the Mutual Aid Network (community-driven effort that expands access to basic life essentials, such as diapers, mattresses, groceries, clothing, hygiene supplies, yard work, and more).After reading through Brown Hope’s application, meeting their team and discussing their organization further, our 5-person grant committee was eager to sign up Grady Britton for 150 volunteer hours throughout the year by awarding them our volunteer grant. While our efforts will mostly focus on the Mutual Aid Network, we look forward to learning more about their other programs and engaging where we can. We also hope our greater community will take the time to learn more about Brown Hope’s impact on our community, and raise your hands to help in any way you can, too.We’ll soon be sharing more on the Grady Britton blog and social media channels about our two incredible runner-ups, with information on how you can help, if you’re looking for volunteer opportunities. To say these grant decisions are difficult to make would be an understatement.We share our sincerest gratitude with every organization that took time to apply and share their stories with us. Above all, thank you for your selfless service to our community.<a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-marketing-grant-to-meso">Be sure to read more about this year’s marketing grant winner, MESO</a>!&nbsp;

Illustration that says "Congrats to our 2021 Volunteer Grant Winner Brown Hope."

Grady Britton Awards 2021 Volunteer Grant to Brown Hope

New in <a href="https://www.campaignlive.com/article/agencies-pick-compromises-during-economic-downturns/1712078">Campaign U.S</a>. GB <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/shane-wolfsmith-promoted-to-managing-director">Managing Director, Shane Wolfsmith</a>, writes about where to make compromises and where to not — an especially challenging line when agency business slows down.&nbsp;In the article he shares how in 2020, select industries may have thrived, but many were devastated by the effects of the pandemic. Agencies? They felt the brunt through lost client work. When work dwindles and new business opportunities dissolve, the market becomes more competitive. Agencies in turn struggle with how to protect their value while keeping their doors open. To not only survive these times of financial hardship, but to also maintain their values, standards of work and overall reputation on the other side, agencies must decide which things are worth compromising and which are not.&nbsp;Providing 3 suggestions on each side of that question, Shane also answers the ever-important question of how do we make it out of this, still us?

Image of hand picking petals off of a flower.

Agencies Should Pick Their Compromises During Economic Downturns

We’re so proud to share that our team took home the award for “Best Integrated Campaign” at the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://ama-pdx.org/max-awards/">2021 American Marketing Association Max Awards (AMAs)</a>, honoring work done for Grady Britton client <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/work/first-interstate-bank">First Interstate Bank</a>.&nbsp;As we’re all too painfully aware, 2020 required more from every one of us. That was no different for our client, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.firstinterstatebank.com/">First Interstate Bank (FIB)</a>. As we approached the new campaign together, we knew FIB had to be more nimble and more flexible, all while calming bank members’ growing financial uncertainty. As a community-oriented bank, they are fully committed to the well-being of their employees, clients and the communities they represent. Our creative had to demonstrate that. And keep pace with ongoing, sweeping changes caused by the pandemic.&nbsp;Because of this, we knew we had to put forth our most nimble and best integrated campaign strategy, strategically designing three campaign phases that evolved along with community members' changing lives – matching the emotion of each moment.Phase 1 - In the early days of the pandemic (remember those?), uncertainty and fear grew exponentially every day. Financial well-being was a big concern as jobs halted with little to no warning. Our first message was to affirm to FIB banking clients that their financial partner was with them through it all. That stability had to be acknowledged in real-time.&nbsp;Creative messaging included: 2 videos, 2 radio spots, 8+ targeted digital display ads, 4+ out-of-home, including localized messaging, and 3 print ads.<figure class="media"><oembed url="https://vimeo.com/showcase/5995875/video/434828648"></oembed></figure>Phase 2 - As communities began to adapt to the pandemic, the bank had to as well. Honesty and transparency became a priority, and the new role of the bank was not about selling products or services, but about recognizing the small changes toward “a new normal” that were happening every day. The evolution to the #20secondsready campaign showcased this spirit through real-life examples of people’s perseverance.&nbsp;Creative messaging was a largely digital/social driven campaign with 1 campaign landing page design, 2 videos, 5 paid social ads, 2 targeted digital display ads and 1 radio spot.<figure class="media"><oembed url="https://vimeo.com/showcase/5995875/video/434838234"></oembed></figure>Phase 3 - Communities began to settle into a new way of life, and with that, we helped FIB show their commitment and optimism to getting through it, together. “Bring on the Day” highlights this spirit and determination.&nbsp;Creative messaging included: 1 video, 4+ targeted digital display ads, 9 paid social ads, 8 out-of-home including localized messaging, 1 radio spot and 8 print ads.<figure class="image image-style-align-center"><img src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/NvLjmCPralZuM7fb3x2moXJMFAyXNtZ6Jx8HVmbUVoVUCxc0sRDJYbaH4mwGdWOwEqZHYwY8Usap46bjE_Uk9zvgt-_aie2Piop3kkiq6TRRfxxHZZ-w1MFdir9K0trxRoRdBBaf" alt="Bring on the Day digital display ad for Grady Britton’s “Best Integrated Campaign” submission."></figure><figure class="media"><oembed url="https://vimeo.com/showcase/5995875/video/486531698"></oembed></figure>We’re beyond proud of our partnership with FIB any given day, but especially during the pandemic as the brand committed itself to responding in real-time to the evolving needs of their communities. Along with the strong creative, our work together achieved substantial year-over-year engagement, particularly in digital. That channel improved average click-through rate by 86% compared to 2019, while spending 16% less budget in the digital media channel, helping us win the "Best Integrated Campaign."As life continues its path of unpredictability into 2021, we look forward to working with FIB to maintain relevance and relationships with the diverse communities they serve.

The word "congrats" repeated in different colors.

Grady Britton Wins Best Integrated Campaign at 2021 AMA Max Awards

Agencies naturally ride the ups and downs of a low-margin, volatile industry any day of the week. It’s part of the business. Layer on the economic and emotional instability that came with 2020, and it’s surprising that agencies survived at all.&nbsp;GB President Paige Campbell <a href="https://www.aaaa.org/what-it-takes-to-be-a-resilient-agency/">writes for 4As</a> about what it takes to be a resilient agency, after she herself has now survived two major economic downturns as an agency owner (Paige and GB co-owner Andy Askren bought GB in 2008). Creating stability in a traditionally tumultuous industry is a constant business challenge. But there are ways to create stability — and it’s about controlling the elements you can and having some preparations in place for those you can’t.Paige shares 3 strategies agencies can prioritize now, so they’re ready for the next major, unexpected change.

What it Takes to be a Resilient Agency

April 12, 2021 update: Our 2021 grant is now closed. Read about <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-marketing-grant-to-meso">MESO, our marketing winner, here</a>. Read about <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-awards-2021-volunteer-grant-to-brown-hope">Brown Hope, our volunteer winner, here</a>.-It's our favorite time of year! We're excited to announce that today <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/grant">applications to our 11th annual grant program are now open</a>. Local nonprofit organizations are invited to apply for $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding expertise, and/or 150 volunteer hours, provided by our Griffs.&nbsp;We recognize that some of Portland’s most impactful organizations do not have the resources to partner with a creative agency long-term. So for 11 years, we've offered $25,000 worth of internal time, to be applied to in-house services including branding, creative development, media planning/buying, public relations or any of our other services.&nbsp;After also offering volunteer hours for the first time last year, we're once again providing 150 volunteer hours to a nonprofit organization serving the greater Portland area. These hours can be applied to organizational needs, as they relate to typical volunteer activities. Given the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, nonprofits that have been greatly impacted are encouraged to apply, along with those that can use help from remote volunteer activities or physically distanced small-group support.“Portland has so many generous, impassioned nonprofits dedicated to bettering our city,” says Paige Campbell, GB President. “We want to help amplify those organizations, especially after such a challenging year for so many.”Organizations can apply to one or both grants online at <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/grant">gradybritton.com/grant</a>. Applications are due Wednesday, March 10 at 6pm.The winner(s) of this year’s grant will join a group of past winners that include <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-brittons-grant-winner-artists-repertory-theatre-is-ready-for-its-debut">Artists Repertory Theatre</a>, <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-grants-friends-of-the-columbia-gorge-a-fresh-brand">Friends of the Columbia Gorge</a>, Meals on Wheels People, S.M.A.R.T, Marathon Scholars, Community Warehouse and others. In 2020, <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/feeding-love-a-year-volunteering-with-transition-projects">Transition Projects</a> was selected as the first-ever volunteer grant winner, and we made it all work in our remote kitchens.Please share this news with any organization you feel could benefit. We look forward to beginning our application review process on March 10.

Text that says the GB Grant is Now Open to submissions with griffith

Grady Britton 2021 Grant Applications Now Open

In 2020, marketing and advertising had to undergo a major transformation. And agencies had to immediately pivot their work. The year? Monumentally challenging. The work? A moving target. In a city with so many talented creative agencies, all of them had to adapt their approach and their message as consumers moved online and took up worthy causes — during a global pandemic.&nbsp;In Oregon Business' February issue, GB President Paige Campbell talks about some of the biggest ways advertising changed this past year, and how agencies had to support that continually evolving messaging. Interviewed alongside other Portland creatives, she shares her perspective and details about a couple of GB clients who stayed relevant and purposeful through it all.&nbsp;Grady Britton has been recognized as one of Top <a href="https://www.designrush.com/agency/digital-marketing/oregon/portland">Digital Marketing Agencies In Portland</a> by DesignRush!

Person holding magnet trying to capture attention of person on phone.

Direction Digital

We're thrilled to share that our very own Shane Wolfsmith has been promoted to GB’s Managing Director!&nbsp;Shane has been our Director of Client Services since 2016. In his new role, Shane will oversee all client experience disciplines across the agency, including account and project management and strategy teams to enhance the value, work and experience provided by our Griffs to our clients.&nbsp;We live by our mission of “Leave Today Better than Yesterday”, and Shane is instrumental in helping us demonstrate that to our clients and community. A few words from Paige: “Shane has been an extraordinary leader and team member to many of us at Grady Britton over the last five years, and we are proud to announce his promotion. Shane leads with values and integrity, and gives of himself every day to our clients and the work. I look forward to our next chapter with Shane leading as Managing Director.”&nbsp;And a few words from the man himself: “I’ve always cared deeply about the value Grady Britton can bring to our clients, not only based upon the work we do, but also the experiences we create through our partnerships with them. I couldn’t be more excited about the opportunity to create even more strategic, meaningful and efficient experiences for our clients through this new structure and team.”While he’s been with us for five years, Shane has been a leader in the marketing and advertising industry for more than 25 years, having built a career in account management at global advertising agencies, including Leo Burnett and Saatchi &amp; Saatchi, as well as smaller to mid-size agencies in Chicago, New York and Portland. He’s also on the 4A’s (American Association of Advertising Agencies) National Business Leadership Committee, as well as a Board of Trustees Member for Northwest Academy, an arts-infused independent school located in Portland.&nbsp;&nbsp;Congrats to Shane!

Shane Wolfsmith Promoted to Managing Director

Since March 2020, not only has it been a challenge to engage journalists due to shrinking newsrooms and furloughs, the news industry has also been inundated with coverage about a global pandemic, a contentious election and social injustice issues. When it comes to media pitching, it’s been difficult to predict how or if the media will respond. Their attention has been pulled in so many critical and time-sensitive directions, breaking through the noise with other stories has been a challenge. What is clear, though, is the pandemic has changed media relations, possibly forever.GB PR Director, Lisa Martin, shares in PR Daily 5 lessons learned in 2020 that can help PR professionals find success for their clients when the media is fatigued and distracted. As she writes, “Something PR professionals continually navigate is that there are always other messages to compete with for newsworthiness and media attention.” But that doesn’t mean our clients’ messages will be lost.

Image of people navigating various communications tools.

How to Adapt Your Pitches During Noisy News Cycles

Business today, when it achieves any kind of scale — prominence, reach, “importance” — automatically assumes additional responsibility. Like it or not, business is a role model. Any success, or how the market rewards brands, comes with real, and increasingly urgent, responsibility.&nbsp;Responsibility not only for an understanding of brands’ relative place in people’s lives (i.e. commerce, capitalism), but also the business’s impact in (with, and on) the world at large. It gets big real fast, doesn’t it? Because of that, those of us in the business of building brands need to think just as big.To paraphrase <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/09/19/patagonias-philosopher-king">Yvon Chouinard</a>, hater of (most) advertising and legendary founder of Patagonia, “Leading an examined life in business is a pain in the ass.”&nbsp;Increasingly more valuable today, and for generations to come, is a business’s Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) performance. ESG is like a dashboard, monitoring a company’s impacts on people, community and resources. Company reporting on ESG efforts is a real thing now. And to a world and its audiences who are watching, these reports are ever more important and indicative of a brand’s real, not just perceived, value.&nbsp;Until recently, activity in these areas, if it was even tracked or monitored at all, was relegated to simplistic PDFs nested in the least-visited corners of company websites. A chart here or there broke up long paragraphs of very grey copy. Which speaks volumes on how meaningful the general market valued them.&nbsp;Things are much different now. Former bastions of values in government and much of society (religion, family, etc.) no longer hold the sway like they once did. Brands — and the companies behind them — are the network of north stars guiding best practices today. Creating change, righting wrongs, setting the future up for success.&nbsp;Conversations, like those around ESG, are bigger. They are not simply, “Let’s take a look at the balance sheet.” They have much bigger picture implications. “Show me you know what your footprint looks like;” “Tell me how you are actively mitigating effects on climate change;” “What are your actions around equity and diversity in your company culture and your community;” “What is the real purpose behind your business?” And more.&nbsp;Showcasing a company’s commitment to these practices with care and attention (and craft and pride) is one of the larger statements brands can make for their long-term success. It’s about why the exist and how.Doing this, treating it not like an afterthought add-on to the everyday, but as an anchor for every single message, marketing investment, incredibly impressive campaign creates real, lasting, meaning. It gives weight, resonance. It builds a responsible brand — with purposeDefining a position on these, and routinely, actively rolling them into business decisions, a brand isn’t simply “growing.” It is taking on as wide and vast a meaning as it can possibly have.&nbsp;This is the value we work so hard on when building brands.&nbsp;Like Yvon says, it is a lot of work. It's the real work we’re meant to be doing.••••••• Andy&nbsp;Askren Creative Director / Partner at Grady Britton&nbsp;You may be interested in our Making Brand Magic in Times of Change Series. <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/welcome-to-now-making-brand-magic-in-times-of-change-part-1">Part 1 is here</a>, and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/reinventing-now-making-brand-magic-in-times-of-change-part-2">part 2 is here</a>.&nbsp;

The Responsibility of Building Responsible Brands

To mark our 10th year of awarding local nonprofits with a $25,000 in-kind marketing grant, and <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/news/grady-britton-turns-45/">45th year as an agency</a>, we decided to offer a second kind of grant, too. Up for grabs was <a href="https://www.gradybritton.com/gb-grant/two-grant-winners-double-the-impact/">150 volunteer hours</a> from our very own Griffs. And while we interviewed some incredible, deserving organizations this time last year, we all immediately connected with <a href="https://www.tprojects.org/">Transition Projects</a> and their mission.&nbsp;As part of their Meal Provider Program, our plan was to assemble random groups of Griffs, giving folks who don’t always work together the opportunity to get to know each other — to gather outside of work and inside Transition Projects’ kitchens. Then the pandemic happened just one meal into our year-long volunteering schedule. Though we had looked forward to cooking in their kitchens for their residents, GB teams had to pivot. Instead, we came together virtually to prepare our meals.&nbsp;For more than 50 years, Transition Projects has helped with housing, sheltering, and finding opportunities for some of Portland’s most vulnerable residents. Their shelters are in our neighborhoods, and while we had hoped to join them there, we took our cooking into our individual homes and <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CCCeXFWFN6-/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link">coordinated meal drop-offs</a> throughout the year.Since February, we planned, purchased, and cooked meals for groups of 35-45 men and women at Clark Center and Jean’s Place. Griffs traded recipes and coordinated dinners like lasagna, shepherd’s pie, casseroles, grilled cheese, and chili. With cookies, ice cream, and pumpkin cakes. Oh, and vegetables, too. We had just a taste of what it takes to plan meals for large groups of people. And sometimes made way too much.&nbsp;As <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CHvGlR-L65-/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link">cheesy as it may seem</a>, food is really such a great way to show care for others. With Transition Projects’ work so critical to our community, people can visit <a href="https://www.tprojects.org/">tprojects.org</a> for open opportunities at the individual and company level. We are so thankful they applied to our first volunteer grant, setting the bar and our hopes high for next year (stay tuned on that). From every Griff, we send our thanks to their volunteer and shelter organizers for their unwavering dedication.*If you’re interested in applying to our 2021 grant, we will share news here in the New Year. Stay tuned, and <a href="https://www.instagram.com/gradybritton/">follow along on social</a>.&nbsp;

Photo of mouth eating spaghetti that spelled like "love."

Feeding Love: A Year Volunteering with Transition Projects

Creative agencies are in a position of influence. The intent of the work produced on behalf of clients is to be seen, to affect decisions and to engage audiences. From brand creation through to advertising and in-market implementation, this work has the ability to either perpetuate the norm or push for change. So as good partners, the responsibility to advocate for inclusivity and elevate equity in clients’ brands and their marketing efforts often falls on agencies.&nbsp;GB Director of Client Services, Shane Wolfsmith, writes in MediaPost about how agencies can determine where clients have power and influence, or could, and bring it to life in truly meaningful ways. He says, “When goals and objectives around DEI are clearly embraced and illustrated in the defining stages of a client/agency engagement, then it becomes easier to hold each other accountable throughout the process. Change is often uncomfortable, challenging and comes with its own set of risks, which is best managed together as partners.” In the article, Shane outlines when in the process to have the conversation, and how to do it to earn buy-in. So you can do it, too.

How Agencies Can Foster Brand Equity and Inclusion

GB 2020 grant winner, Artists Repertory Theatre, has had quite the year. In addition to the brand we created together as part of our annual grant program, they introduced a new Mercury Company and debuted visionary works across new mediums during these times of physical distancing.&nbsp;Featured in Oregon Business Magazine, Artist Rep’s artistic director Dámaso Rodríguez reflects on the year they had and what that means for the year ahead. GB President Paige Campbell also makes an appearance, talking about the sheer joy of working with nonprofits with extraordinary community impact.

Artists Rep’s New Identity for New Era

<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/Artists_Repertory_Theatre_NewBranding_Logo_HiRes-scaled.jpg" height="1707" width="2560">Stage, set. Spotlight, on. We selected Artists Repertory Theatre (ART) as our 2020 grant winner, providing the nonprofit organization with $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding services. On the exciting brink of a new building that will serve as a resource for the greater Portland arts community, while also creating new creative works and educational programming, the partnership with ART was focused around building a cohesive vision for an organization doing so much, for so many, and expressing it through an inspired and unified lens.&nbsp;Founded in 1982, ART is the longest-running professional theatre company in Portland, Ore. and produces intimate, provocative theatre while providing a home for a diverse community of artists and audiences. ART is an active and engaged community leader in providing an ArtsHub as a shared community resource to support Portland nonprofits; hosting education programs to develop theatre artists, students, arts professionals and life-long learners at every ability; and developing creative outlets like Table|Room|Stage to help produce new work specifically by BIPOC writers, women, LGBTQIA+ and gender nonconforming writers. The organization also created the repertory Mercury Company with PPP Funds to employ more than 50 artists.&nbsp;<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/Artists_Repertory_Theatre_NewBranding_Showcase_02-scaled.jpg" height="1709" width="2560">The organization is pivotal to our community, and since they’ve been around for nearly 40 years, ART was experiencing some brand inconsistencies. Our opportunity was to clarify the mission and align messaging. And to express it all with a new logo and brand tools. From a branding standpoint, our teams first had to work together to distill their what as led by their why. ART needed a solid foundation in order to continue evolving their brand. So we began there.&nbsp;Through the brand messaging, we sought to simplify their hard-working mission. And add a tagline for singular expression: exhilarate + illuminate. Because with everything ART does, their work does that. They shine a light on things not previously seen, heard, discussed. Plus, it also has the fun double play, giving the sense of a literal stage.&nbsp;Our work also coincided with the construction of their incredible new building. Something that’s angular, minimalist, solid. So the new logo became a spirited complement: modern, vibrant, fluid. Because of ART’s commitment to equity, diversity, and inclusion, it was critical that the new brand design gave space to other cultures through varied expressions.&nbsp;<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/Artists_Repertory_Theatre_NewBranding_OurPalette_HIRes-scaled.jpg" height="1707" width="2560">In the logo, a translucence gives view into both bold and hidden elements — layers reflective of the storytelling seen in their productions. Its composition is also intentional. Known by a few names — Artists Repertory Theatre, Artists Rep, ART —&nbsp;it represents all, and is recognizable as a brand monogram. The extensivity of the color palette also allows freedom for change across seasons. Because art — and ART — are constantly changing.&nbsp;From logo and color palette, to messaging, tagline, and brand guidelines, the new brand for Artists Rep tells the story of the organization’s impact on our city, and its ongoing dedication to share honest, relevant, stimulating work from diverse artists. We are thrilled that we could partner with ART’s team through our grant program this year. They champion our community. And reflect so many others in their work.&nbsp;*While we all eagerly await returning to live theatre soon, share in ART’s mission and work by visiting <a href="https://artistsrep.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">artistsrep.org</a>.<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/Artists_Repertory_Theatre_NewBranding_Showcase_01_Closeup-scaled.jpg" height="1707" width="2560">

Grady Britton’s Grant Winner Artists Repertory Theatre is Ready for its Debut

<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB_lighthouse_740x400-1.jpg" height="400" width="740">Your brand’s purpose is bigger than you think. Very good news for any brand out to change the world and leave a lasting legacy.&nbsp;There’s a significant social shift that’s been underway for some time fueling this; our new COVID-19 world has accented it. Once-untouchable, stalwart institutions like government and even organized religion have been steadily losing their age-old perception of invulnerability and trust, eroded by exposure, scandal, ferment, and in-fighting.&nbsp;Assuming the role of principled, steady-handed leadership in peoples’ minds (and hearts) today: brands. Brands engaged in, showing up for, championing all kinds of causes beyond simple consumerism.&nbsp;“Have a Coke and a Smile – don’t forget the social change, too.” This has moved way beyond the selling of things. In fact, we would argue that in order to make any kind of a sale today, your brand first needs to make a statement. You need to be in the conversation, and it needs to jive with who you say you are. DEI, sustainability, business alliances, working conditions, community benefit – what’s your story?&nbsp;Making a statement is taking a position. Taking a position requires heart. Combining heart with business isn’t exactly taught in schools and isn’t traditionally invited into boardrooms. And yet, you can’t not stand for something now. Audiences want to know what matters to you.&nbsp;Here are two things to be ready for as you move your brand into what might be new territory for you:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;YOU WILL BE CHALLENGED. Much like this post, you can’t say everything all at once. Nor should you ;-) Roll out your position in a steady cadence of both messages and actions. Engage and invite discussion in social channels. This is not about defending a position as much as it is demonstrating involvement and a commitment to transparency.&nbsp;YOU WON’T BE PERFECT. Humility is maybe the most human trait there is for a brand. Admitting what needs fixing, showing progress –&nbsp;these show a vitality, a living-breathing connectedness to growth and change and improvement your audiences (and the world in general) are longing for. (And very much following along with.)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Doing this takes courage, bravery, leadership. It’s difficult. And it’s inspiring. Are you ready?&nbsp;&nbsp;

Reinventing Now – Is Your Brand a Beacon?

Newly featured in GDUSA, our new brand work for sustainable vertical farm, Forward Greens! For nearly 60 years, GDUSA has covered everything from new work to new technology in the graphic design industry, and we’re pretty excited to now see our work.A little background: Forward Greens farms for the love of community, food and the planet. No pesticides, no GMOs, no nonsense — just 19 days, on average, from seed to shelf. To illustrate that, the design is vibrantly colorful. And the packaging is one of a kind.Selected after a lengthy packaging search process to find the smallest footprint possible, something sustainable and something that offers a simpler production process, the tetrahedron is a completely different look for the produce aisle. As bagged lettuces is a crowded market, the look had to be distinctive to stand out.&nbsp;

Grady Britton Breaks Produce Packaging Rules

Newly featured in Packaging of the World, our new brand work for sustainable vertical farm, Forward Greens! As one of the leading packaging design blogs, Packaging of the World “aims to inspire designers from all around the world by publishing some of the most interesting and creative projects.”Well, we’re thrilled they selected our work for this joyful brand. Forward Greens farms for the love of community, food and the planet. No pesticides, no GMOs, no nonsense — just 19 days, on average, from seed to shelf. To illustrate that, the design is vibrantly colorful. And the packaging is one of a kind.Selected after a lengthy packaging search process to find the smallest footprint possible, something sustainable and something that offers a simpler production process, the tetrahedron is a completely different look for the produce aisle. As bagged lettuces is a crowded market, the look had to be distinctive to stand out.

Forward Greens Brand

<a href="https://www.forwardgreens.com" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Forward Greens</a> is a company out to do good and sow simple, approaching farming through the joy of it. Our partnership began when they were still known as West Village Farms. They wanted a new brand, and needed to bring what they stood for to life. And get consumers on board, too.<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/LI_FG_logos.jpg" height="1200" width="2400">A discovery session with stakeholders helped us prioritize the mission and the new brand go for — joy! We wanted something happy and human, especially because their competitors (other vertical farms) come from a brand position of high-tech. Sure, it’s how they farm (growing a fields-worth of greens in a warehouse-worth of space). But it’s not why. With this vision, we started thinking through new names, eventually picking the one that communicated a radically simple idea — one that says it’s time we treated our place here, in this little world, with a little more dignity. One that says we farm food, as fresh as nature would make, that asks the least of our resources. One that says things are moving — and we’re about it all moving the right way. A name that represented a drive to be innovative and a will to be ambitious.Forward Greens.Forward Greens farms for the love of community, food and the planet. No pesticides, no GMOs, no nonsense — just 19 days, on average, from seed to shelf. To illustrate that, the new logo is designed with rounded typography and subtle imperfections, a crest that nods at tradition, and a leaf that looks a little like an exclamation point. It sparks that joy. And outside of the brand’s primary palette of black, white and green, it’s vibrantly colorful, with a secondary palette of 10 accent colors.&nbsp;<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/FG_pack_all_up.jpg" height="1200" width="1200">When the time for packaging came, we knew bagged-lettuce is a crowded market. Produce aisles are filled with options, so this one needed to stand out. Selected after a lengthy packaging search process to find the smallest footprint possible, something sustainable and something that offered a simpler production process, the tetrahedron took the win. It’s a completely different look for the produce aisle, and a stark change from the West Village Farm clamshell.Working with the shape, though, was a challenge — with no clear front, back, top, bottom or even side. But wanting movement on the bag, a creative exploration included hand drawing shapes to test how they could wrap the bag until they aligned in a way that made visual sense…and wasn’t so awkward. We found one. To communicate that this is a small brand, local to Washington and Oregon, we also included Forward Greens’ Founder Ken Kaneko’s signature and illustrated photo to personalize the package.&nbsp;<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/FG_Brand_Guidelines_book.jpg" height="2500" width="2500">While every food category has a certain vernacular, the design for Forward Greens breaks the rules. This new brand design stretches accepted notions of produce packaging design while ensuring the product still looks appetizing (kinda important). Plus, we left room to still be able to see what’s inside. People want fresh.&nbsp;Across our eight months of work together — we’re talking brand discovery, brand anthem, rename, logo, colors, typography, packaging, copywriting, brand guidelines — we accomplished what we set out to do, and made produce aisles a little brighter. Forward Greens is now available in all premium grocers in Oregon, with 26 new retailers in Washington.

New Brand Forward Greens Goes for Joy

Giving meaning to marketing data by connecting the dots across channels helps prove the value in a diverse set of tactics, and guides future decision making. And that work? Well, someone has to do it.GB Senior Digital Strategist Sarah Eaton writes in MediaPost about how to add specificity to marketing goals that are based on the desired customer journey and not just the supporting metrics. She demonstrates how to create a more strategic approach to marketing so that data tells a clearer story of success, and even provides the steps and tools so you can do it, too. Ask the right questions upfront, and the answers are usually a little clearer when you have all that data to sift through.&nbsp;

Drive Action Through Marketing Data by Giving it Meaning

<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/070820_BLM.png" height="800" width="1480">For the last three years, Grady Britton, led by our internal Equity, Inclusion, and Diversity team, has been working to increase our EDI proficiency. Through workshops, seminars and partnerships, we’ve learned the best way to improve is to look inward. And do it honestly, with a critical eye. Review our internal policies and practices. Learn, adjust, and take meaningful steps of action.&nbsp;&nbsp;And we know “action” is a long-term, ongoing commitment; not a moment. So we’re going to keep at it, doing everything we can to create real change. We began by putting our money where our passions are.&nbsp;&nbsp;Which is why throughout June, Griffs, along with an agency match, donated nearly $17,000 to social justice-oriented organizations. While employees chose the individual organizations they gave to, each one supports communities of color across critical initiatives and services, including education, mental health, legal defenses and bail, and the protection of civil and human rights.&nbsp;We’re sharing those organizations below in the hope that they’ll continue to be supported beyond now. We welcome your suggestions for others. And we’ll also continue to share our ongoing efforts and progress happening internally to affect things both in our office and out.<a href="https://www.aclu.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">ACLU</a><a href="http://www.basicrights.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Basic Rights of Oregon Education Fund</a><a href="https://www.beam.community/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">BEAM</a><a href="https://blacklivesmatter.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Black Lives Matter Global Network</a><a href="https://www.blackresiliencefund.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Black Resilience Fund</a><a href="https://www.blackvisionsmn.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Black Visions Collective</a><a href="https://www.dontshootpdx.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Don’t Shoot PDX</a><a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/elijah-mcclain" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Elijah McClain</a><a href="https://eji.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Equal Justice Initiative</a><a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/homeless-black-trans-women-fund?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=m_pd+share-sheet" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Homeless Black Trans women fund</a><a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/9v4q2-justice-for-breonna-taylor" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Justice for Breonna Taylor</a><a href="https://thelovelandfoundation.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Loveland Foundation</a><a href="https://marshap.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Marsha P. Johnson Institute</a><a href="https://minnesotafreedomfund.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Minnesota Freedom Fund</a><a href="https://m4bl.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Movement for Black Lives</a><a href="https://www.naacp.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">NAACP</a><a href="https://www.naacpldf.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">NAACP Legal Defense &amp; Education Fund</a><a href="https://nlgsf.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">National Lawyers Guild San Francisco</a><a href="http://www.oregoninnocence.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Oregon Innocence Project</a><a href="https://www.selfenhancement.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Self Enhancement, Inc.</a><a href="https://www.splcenter.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Southern Poverty Law Center</a><a href="https://uncf.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">United Negro College Fund</a><a href="https://www.untilfreedom.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Until Freedom</a>

Our Commitment to Continuing and Bettering EDI Efforts

In PR, there is a lot of pressure to set goals and deliver on metric-driven key performance indicators (KPIs). After all, that numerical data is available. Sometimes those numbers look really great. And big. But in an industry as largely nuanced as PR, success simply cannot be measured by impressions and mentions alone.GB PR Account Supervisor Kayla Golden <a href="https://www.prdaily.com/successful-pr-is-more-than-a-handful-of-impressions/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">writes in PR Daily</a> about how PR can’t be measured in the same way sales can, so PR professionals have to champion the creation of KPIs that both reflect the work done and also demonstrate its value. As she says, “Recognizing what matters most to our clients and understanding the type of work that goes into achieving those results is the first step in helping them understand that successful PR is built upon a combination of quantified growth metrics and qualified intangible value.”Kayla shares the questions to ask to help align with clients early on and set true metrics of success.

Successful PR is More than Impressions

<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB-Thought-Leadership-Graphic-2_Blog-1.jpg"></figure>Ready for the great “reopening?” A restart sounds like a real relief, right? Yes – and – in a lot of ways, the messiest part of the pandemic disruption may be about to begin. State by state, community by community, lockdowns are being lifted. With no universal agreement on exactly how best to do it safely.&nbsp;Reopening won’t look like a return to a former normal. What’s normal is what’s now. Let’s get your brand ready for that. (Spoiler alert: things are going to be, shall we say, “pliable,” for a while; your brand’s response will need to be, too.)<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB-Thought-Leadership-Graphic-2_Blog-2.jpg"></figure>We’re awash in data, facts, trends. It can be hard not to get lost or overwhelmed by it all, there are clues to pockets of unmet needs or underserved markets. Filter it for gems that can inform how (and where) your brand shows up; embrace that guidance.&nbsp;Maybe it’s emotional (ex. isolation, loneliness, boredom)&nbsp;Maybe it’s tangible (ex. food supply, sanitization, healthcare)Maybe it’s need-based (ex. healthcare, food)&nbsp;Maybe it’s want-based (ex. solving boredom)&nbsp;What you can do right now:<ul><li>Elevate your CSR program; visibility around corporate social responsibility actions are as valuable as any currency now.</li><li>Demonstrate adaptability; make changes that help now – making your product or service more useful, affordable, relevant, etc.</li></ul><figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB-Thought-Leadership-Graphic-2_Blog-3.jpg"></figure>Change in unnerving. Audiences are looking for stability, security, something solid they can believe in as they reacclimate. Ironically, your brand adapting, flexing, showing up in new, surprisingly appropriate ways, can offer the grounding effect that is so desperately wanted. What’s that look like? It looks like heart. And heart looks like these things:&nbsp;<ul><li>People over profits – If you have the ability to help, help. It may affect the bottom line now, but assures brand affinity later. Taking care of people is good business, now and always.</li><li>Nurture trust – What you do now impacts how you’re seen later.</li><li>Adapt, repeat – Revisit your routines for doing business. Look at your processes, product, service with entirely new eyes and ask, “What’s possible?”</li><li>Empower your people – Does your staff have what they need to live your brand promise authentically and nimbly?</li><li>A “Will To Be Great” – People remember good that stands out. Be that agent of change that leaves a lasting effect, a legacy in your category and with the people you serve.</li></ul>&nbsp;See it in action:Mackenzie Leads with Design.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB-Thought-Leadership-Graphic-2_V4_Blog-4.jpg"></figure>This leading integrated-design firm set out to answer the question on everyone’s minds: what will building spaces look like post-COVID-19? From retail to healthcare to public facilities to workspaces, design and function will need to change.&nbsp;Our PR team shared news of the firm’s newly released <a href="http://www.mcknze.com/covid-19-design-guide">COVID-19 Design Guide</a> with the media, while also positioning Mackenzie's deeply experienced team as thought leaders in the several sectors that aligned with their qualifications for additional storytelling opportunities.<ul><li>9 articles in 4 publications earned</li><li>1 broadcast interview earned</li><li>Garnered media attention for Mackenzie, its team and its services</li><li>A timely and relevant way to showcase Mackenzie’s forward thinking vision and ongoing dedication to clients</li></ul>&nbsp;Beloved brands show heart.No one can change who we were before this global pandemic turned our world upside down, but we can look at who we are because of it.&nbsp;We can pivot, polish, and shine our purpose to ensure we’re better and will stay that way.&nbsp;Reach out if a quick consultation would be helpful.&nbsp;And we’ll meet you back here for more in our series.

Reinventing Now–Making Brand Magic in Times of Change: Part 2

We were thrilled to select <a href="https://gorgefriends.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Friends of the Columbia Gorge</a> as our 2019 grant winner, providing the organization with $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding services.Created in 1980 due to mass urban development encroaching into the Columbia Gorge, a group of citizens led by Nancy Russell officially formed Friends of the Columbia Gorge. By 1986, they secured federal legislation to protect the area under the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area Act. Since then, Friends works with government agencies and other groups in both Oregon and Washington state to ensure private land is brought into public ownership (over 41,000 acres since their founding). They remove non-native species, replant native vegetation, and protect fragile resources on land trust-owned properties. They review development applications, lead education programming, and just downright protect the irreplaceable land and its resources.They’re darn good dogooders.&nbsp;<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/FOTG_mug_BLOG_post.png" height="667" width="1000">After the devastating fire in 2017, Friends received a lot of attention and donations to help clean up the damage. The community was hurting. The land literally burning. But their work? So much more than repair; it’s about protection in the first place.Friends operates as leaders-in-service to multiple communities — atypical to other conservation nonprofits, as protection of public lands is only one aspect of what they do. So after the fire, they emerged as the voice of reason and leader in the region, for diverse stakeholders with varying interests — some at odds with one another. It became clear we needed to help Friends understand what themes and insights were a key priority for who they were as an organization, as well as for their various audiences. We led brand workshops to surface and galvanize strong ideas and opinions so our brand positioning and thinking moving forward was aligned for them internally.&nbsp;Friends then had their why. “To keep the Gorge a vibrant living place — wondrous, wild, and open to all — for future generations.” So we shifted to the creative expressions, or their how— voice, messaging, and an updated visual identity. As leaders not only in the wake of a crisis, but for future generations, we sought to enhance the vibrancy and versatility of the organization.The descriptive name is something that worked in our favor. Friends of the Columbia Gorge spells out the who, so the messaging could lean on this, rounding out the story from different angles.&nbsp;&nbsp;<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/FOTG_stationery_BLOG_post.png" height="667" width="1000">We also explored the rich territory of tone of voice. Friends staff needed guidance on best practices for communicating with all of its constituents, in practical, colloquial terms. We provided conversation-starters and short scripts based on themes highlighted in the workshops.We also created a new illustrated logo. Due to the holistic approach of the Friends organization, their competitive landscape was quite complex. We had to consider a wide variety of contending entities in different industries when it came to design. Their existing identity did not convey the scope and professionalism in which Friends operate. So part of our creative challenge was to not only deliver a brand identity system that was distinctive in their field, but to demonstrate a level of validity to their audience. We also saw an opportunity to craft something aesthetically modern and future-facing — which none of their competitors were owning. Ultimately, our strategy was to build a brand identity that was simple, recognizable, and authoritative without sacrificing the friendly aspect of the organization.With that, the new logo conveys trust and protection. A square communicates the non-profit’s holistic approach to its conservation work, and within, an illustration of the actual Columbia River puts the brand in place. A new font uplevels the organization’s presence and authority, leveraging the approachability of san-serif but adding structure. The look is intended to echo the name itself, adding a sense of friendliness while curves speak to the movement of water. And perhaps you’ve noticed: the “G” also mimics the recycled symbol.&nbsp;<img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/FOTG_beanie_BLOG_post.png" height="750" width="1000">The color palette represents the vitality of the area: bright grass green is the Gorge’s springtime color, and felt like the right pick for the new look. Subsidiary logos include a brown, canyon-like color, along with a blue to match the river — all in tune with nature. By matching pantones to the photos taken of the Gorge, we found a way to bring nature into the Friends’ brand.As Friends works to promote and safeguard a higher vision for the Gorge, the organization is also tasked with gaining the trust of multiple audiences — from donors to recreationists. Preservation. Protection. Trust. Advocacy. Pride.&nbsp;Friends devotes so much to our community and to our region, protecting an area we are all lucky to explore and call home. They’ve been here for 40 years, and we feel privileged to have helped them come into this anniversary by working together through a brand refresh. This organization’s mission is exactly why we started the Grady Britton grant program 10 years ago, and we are proud to have partnered on this, all while pushing Friends toward something broader and bigger, bringing the importance of their work to new generations.&nbsp;

Grady Britton “Grants” Friends of the Columbia Gorge a Fresh Brand

<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB-Thought-Leadership-Graphic-1_Blog-1.jpg"></figure>And just like that – you are here. Your business, your consumers, the brand. Everything that was is in a very different place than when we rang in 2020.&nbsp;The disruptions from COVID-19 to markets and expectations are real. They’ve also created ideal conditions for your brand to show up better than ever. Vital, relevant, even – dare we say – magical.&nbsp;&nbsp;You can still be the leader and leave the legacy you’ve dreamed of for your brand. In fact, it’s more important than ever that that happens. Consider how your brand would answer these questions, with more to come in following weeks:<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB-Thought-Leadership-Graphic-1_Blog-2.jpg"></figure>Purpose matters more than ever. Now’s the time to really declare it, showcase it, fly it high. Let your brand be the one that shows up (and behaves) as personal, familiar, confident, reliable. Your messages and actions should embrace what’s going on today; does what you’re doing deliver on your mission and values and the promise you made when you first opened for business?<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB-Thought-Leadership-Graphic-1_Blog-3.jpg"></figure>Crises are the ultimate B.S. meters. People are looking for solid, thoughtful displays of brand promises; cliched positivity and blanket messages simply won’t work.&nbsp;Do you have something people need right now? Opt for clear and direct.Do you have something to help people cope? Opt for caring and concerned.&nbsp;Do you have something to distract? Read the room, and then opt for sensitivity with optimism.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/GB-Thought-Leadership-Graphic-1_Blog-4.jpg"></figure>Do these things today:&nbsp;<ul><li>Take stock of where your audience engages most with your brand. Is it social media? Which platform? Your website? Invest your time in the platforms that work best for your brand right now. Make sure the content is what your audience is engaging with currently.</li><li>Your brand is a fraction of your audience’s life: free tools like Google Analytics or Facebook Audience Insights can give you a peek at who your customers are and what their needs are right now. Based on those findings, shift messaging so it meets them where they are, or helps them think about you in the future.</li><li>Update your owned channels – your website and social media profiles – with your COVID-19 policies, including closures, changes in hours, updates to work policies, etc. Update Yelp if your business leverages it for business, where you can add an editable COVID-19 Advisory Alert Banner. If your business uses Google My Business, update business hours or mark your business as Temporarily Closed.</li><li>Keep staff and partners aligned and clear on daily changes; over-communicate via e-mail, all-team meetings and other platforms. The more they know about the state of your business, the better brand ambassadors they will be.</li></ul>&nbsp;As the country reopens:&nbsp;<ul><li>Audiences will be cautious. They are craving “a return to normal” but will re-emerge slowly – looking for what their trusted brands are doing, how they are engaging in current (ever-changing) conditions.</li><li>Meet them where they are. Fly your purpose flag high. Concentrate on highly-visible channels where you can update content quickly. Conditions and sentiment will evolve rapidly, weekly, and even daily. Be sure your messaging can, too.</li><li>Tap into the power of PR to stay relevant and build relationships with the media who are hungry for good news. Which you are a source of, right?</li></ul>&nbsp;See it in Action:First Interstate, “Twenty Seconds”&nbsp;&nbsp;First Interstate Bank’s purpose has always been to see that their communities thrive. Given recent events, we honed the messaging to be one of reassurance; that in 50+ years of business, they’d weathered a lot of ups and downs with their communities. They are in it for the long-haul, one day at a time — regardless of what those days look like.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Working with a trusted director who not only shot our idea solo (safely), in his home, with his daughter and wife, we created a thoughtful single-take spot that captures the essence of what it means to be ready for what the day holds. <a href="https://www.firstinterstatebank.com/20seconds">A special URL</a> points to a landing page spotlighting the human moments all around us.&nbsp;Total time for concept, to execution, to in-market? Just under 3 weeks.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;We’re helping brands sort through what’s needed now and take action — be in touch if a consultation would be helpful. And we’ll meet you back here for the second part in our series.

Welcome to Now–Making Brand Magic in Times of Change: Part 1

What legacy do you want to leave? And who do you want to affect? GB Partner and Creative Director Andy Askren writes in Portland Business Journal about the need for creative agencies to ask these questions.&nbsp;For companies without that same “freedom of budget” as the big guys, they still need a way to get their stories into the world. Those small-to-medium-sized businesses are the engine of our economy. They account for nearly half the country’s employees and were responsible for about two-thirds of net new job creation from 2010 to 2017. It may be difficult to prioritize full-fledged brand development or marketing over dozens of other things they need to run, but they’re not oblivious to it. Many are often already in digital spaces, doing their best while doing everything else to keep the lights on.Agencies have to make similar business decisions, too. When taking on what might be a smaller company or smaller budget, or even pro bono efforts, it can boil down to, financially, can we make this work?If agencies want to, then they can often find a way. Read the full article in Portland Business Journal to learn more from Andy about why prioritizing the little guy is more important than ever, and how agencies can realistically get it done.

The Importance of Equitable Access to Great Design

Agency account managers are responsible — as people, for people and for so many aspects of client relationships and their projects. But identifying the most important thing they do is easy: being human.GB Director of Client Services Shane Wolfsmith <a href="https://www.campaignlive.com/article/bringing-humanity-account-management/1675548" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">writes in Campaign US</a> about the importance of bringing humanity into the role of account management. As he says, “There are a multitude of stressors at play in client management that pull us away from our natural sense of humanness, but that very humanness is essential to creating enduring, trusting and influential relationships with clients. And creating those types of relationships are the greatest achievement of any account manager.”Shane continues by outlining strategies to bring this into daily practice, reminding us all that work is usually the most successful when we get a little personal.<a href="https://www.campaignlive.com/article/bringing-humanity-account-management/1675548" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Read the article on Campaign US</a>.&nbsp;

Bringing Humanity to Account Management

“What’s the purpose of having core values at your agency? What role do they play in the agency’s positioning and growth?” GB President Paige Campbell answers this and more on the latest podcast episode from Dendrocast, The Role Of Values In Agency Growth.When Paige and Andy Askren bought Grady Britton 10 years ago, they wondered…why would a city already saturated with agencies need another one? They decided a strong set of values was the answer to that question, and still is every day. From the people they hire, to the clients they partner with, to the work that’s produced, leading by values is a top-down business decision at Grady Britton.On Dendrocast, Paige shares how this business model affects operations — for new business, culture and management.

The Role of Values in Agency Growth

Portland is in no short supply of agencies. And agencies specifically boasting world-class talent. The landscape has dramatically grown over the past 10 years, reaching hundreds of creative agencies that span niche offerings to full-service everything. Oregon Business Magazine asked GB partners Paige Campbell and Andy Askren about some of the changes they’ve noticed since purchasing the agency in 2009.While GB effectively competes by centering everything around near-and-dear-held values, constantly focused on doing right by the world, it’s also about being clear on the work you do…and actually want to do.Read the full article in Oregon Business Magazine.

A Mad Ad World

Can you run a successful agency if you focus on your values, relationships and what is really meaningful to people? Grady Britton President and Partner Paige Campbell thinks so, and we’re proof. She writes in MediaPost about focusing on meaningful work, and how agencies should consider what they’re affecting in the world and who they’re affecting it for.&nbsp;But it’s more than just the feel-good stuff. Even when opting to be an agency set out to do good, business is business. So while helping the good guys win feels great, agencies have to be prepared for the business challenges to do that work. There will be sacrifices. There will come a time when you have to say no to a big budget.&nbsp;In the article, Paige shares more about how to lead with values in every business decision, and the benefits agencies experience when it works. Because the world needs what responsible, thoughtful brands bring. It also needs agencies that help those brands succeed.&nbsp;

How Brand Values Impact the Agency Business

To create is to change. And looking ahead to 2020, we know what worked this past year won’t necessarily be The Thing in the next. The Grady Britton creative team spoke with <a href="https://www.creativebloq.com/features/graphic-design-trends-2020" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Creative Bloq for their feature, “20 Top Graphic Design Trends For 2020</a>” about what’s headed our way. You can read the full feature via the link above.We know styles adapt as societies do. That great design tells stories, and stories are never stagnant. So we asked our Grady Britton creative team two juicy questions:<ul><li>What’s a design trend you predict will be big in 2020?&nbsp;</li><li>What’s a design trend you hope disappears by 2020?</li></ul>Here, we’re recapping all of Grady Britton’s thoughts (including some that aren’t in the feature—yeah, we’re givers) for a look at how design will continue to evolve.Andy Askren, Grady Britton Partner and Executive Creative DirectorBig design trends:&nbsp;There will be a continual looking-to-the-past for inspiration: heavier, rounder fonts mixed with larger, more pronounced serif fonts. Saturated colorways and design cues from the vaults will be what’s hot. It’s been coming for a while, but it’s going to explode this year as more brands, both old and new, work to introduce “roots” to their stories, even if they don’t have them — recalling simpler, more honest times (and values) any way they can.&nbsp;Disappearing design trends:I hope mobile design gets its UX act together and figures out how to serve up ads either unobtrusively or in a way that doesn’t destroy the content I came to see in the first place. There’s too much gimicky, first-gen pop-up noise that makes me want to throw my phone away altogether and grab a freakin’ magazine.&nbsp;Brian Dixon, Group Creative DirectorBig design trends:In line with marketing’s ongoing quest for transparency and honesty, design will continue to strip away extra flare and embellishment and move toward a much simpler, straightforward presentation. It may even veer into intentionally unfinished at times as believability is the priority.Disappearing design trends:Fake authenticity is out. As our fascination with quantity of information plateaus, the quality of information will become more important.&nbsp;Adam Murdoch, Senior Art DirectorBig design trends:Equity-focused marketing will continue, as brands continue to show they “believe everyone is of equal and important value.” But what will change in 2020 is putting real funds toward actual causes behind their message. Care-washing will continue to be heavily called-out in the year ahead, meaning companies need real action behind sappy commercials.Simplified and minimal product offerings, but with customization, will also be big, such as consumer product companies minimizing and simplifying the products they offer with fewer pricing tiers, options and variations. To accompany these changes, top-level products will come with on-demand customization and personalization options.&nbsp;Design minimalism will shift toward warm and cozy, with interactive design’s white and light luxury brand color palette going warm and friendlier. Beige, sage and pale yellow will show up more frequently.Disappearing design trends:Generification of logos and brands are on the way out. It didn’t start with Google’s Material Design system, but it deeply influenced so many designers to strip things down to their bare essentials. Then, it went a few steps further. Now brands like Burberry end up with minimal slab- and sans-serif logos built from off-the-shelf fonts. These design systems are so minimal and utilitarian the ownability of their look and feel is gone. The next year is an opportunity for brands to be truly authentic and allow the history and narrative to be a living part of their stories and visuals. This can’t be done when design systems look like a template.Wasteful and paper-heavy direct mail will be ditched. In the days of climate change awareness, it’s surprising companies aren’t spending more time on smart messaging and campaign creative and less on paper-heavy, direct-mail initiatives.&nbsp;&nbsp;Ethan Nguyen, Senior Art DirectorBig design trends:Tasteful use of depth and textures will dominate the graphic landscape as designers diametrically react to the past few years of minimal flat design, and seek to replicate more of the natural tactile world.Disappearing design trends:The overuse of trendy techniques, such as line graphics or over-embellishments, to mask the lack of a conceptual idea is on the way out. The saturation of this type of design will make people crave more thoughtful and intentional visual communications.&nbsp;&nbsp;Katie Larosa, DesignerBig design trends:There’s been a trend to break the rules that, as designers, we never thought you could break. We’ll see more bold, decorative typography that pushes conventional boundaries, and some “bad” design done on purpose.Disappearing design trends:While minimalism can serve its purpose, more options are coming onto the scene. Similarly, sans-serif fonts aren’t the only choice anymore. Things are a little more colorful and interesting, which is maybe a reaction to several years of simplicity and minimalism.&nbsp;Paul Levy, DesignerBig design trends:The ubiquity of flat design will continue to grow. Flat design started as a backlash to overly complicated Flash-based sites with their often absurd animations and long load times. Flat design relies on primary colors, simple, intuitive two-dimensional illustrations and easy-to-read type. Ideally, it allows users to quickly interact with and find content they’re looking for. While it owes its origins to the digital realm, many of its principles have started to influence the printed medium as well. Most content is now broken into a more user-friendly hierarchy, ideally making content relevant to the reader easier to find. As designers, we often forget that our primary function is communication. Flat design, along with the evolving discipline of UX design, gives designers a powerful tool to help people easily navigate content.Disappearing design trends:Ironically, I see a growing backlash against the overuse of icons in design. Like flat design, icons owe their origin (or at least, ubiquity) to the digital world. Often used in place of descriptive copy, it’s easy to see how iconography has become increasingly common in our digital lives. Thanks to Apple (and lest we mention emojis), almost all instructive copy has been replaced with iconography. You can easily see the value of employing symbols over words when a website has limited real estate to work with and a need for quick navigation. While iconography can help make dry, statistics-based content more engaging, it can also clutter design and make simple content more confusing.

Predicting 2020 Design Trends

Grady Britton is celebrating 45 years as a Portland agency. We’ve helped countless companies tell their stories. We’ve donated $800,000+ back into our community (just in the last 10 years). We’ve had two pairs of dedicated leaders.&nbsp;To celebrate our anniversary year, we spoke with the two people who started it all—Frank Grady and Cherry Britton—and the two people running it all now—Paige Campbell and Andy Askren. They reflect on where we started, how we’ve grown, and the direction we’re headed next.&nbsp;<img src="http://gradybritton.com/wp-content/uploads/Screen-Shot-2019-12-09-at-2.38.27-PM.png" height="860" width="1147">FRANK GRADY, FOUNDERWhen you first began the agency, in what ways did you hope to see it grow? In the beginning, the agency provided a path for me to offer services to local companies in an independent manner. I’ve always enjoyed helping clients be successful, providing solutions and outside perspectives. My goal in the beginning was to build a stable base of clients, and to learn and grow along with them — shared values and mutual success were the overall goals. The payoff was the stimulation of engaging in challenges for a wide variety of companies and personalities.&nbsp;What about this agency’s 45-year history makes you most proud? I am most proud of the culture, integrity, and heart of Grady Britton. The agency has always been grounded in providing high-quality advertising and remarkable service to its clients. The agency has helped our industry and our community become economically stronger. And the heart of GB has helped so many non-profits and individuals be successful. The agency is an example of what good companies can do to grow their employees, be successful, and make our community healthier.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;CHERRY BRITTON, ORIGINAL PARTNERWhen you first began the agency, in what ways did you hope to see it grow? From the beginning, our goals were to create a space that brought value to our clients while honoring the lives and contributions of all who worked at the agency. What that client value was in specific detail changed and grew over time as the agency grew and matured. But the goal of treating clients and employees with integrity never changed. That guided every decision and every transaction, internally and externally.Of the two of us, Frank was always the one with real vision. It seemed like he knew where he was going from Day One! I hung onto my hat — for the most part — and said, “Let’s go!” Then we both pitched in to make his vision happen.What about this agency’s 45-year history makes you most proud? Well, of course the work speaks for itself. Hard not to be proud of that. But what I am most proud of concerns people — how many friendships were made and sustained, inter-agency and with clients. The bands. The bowling and softball team. The Grady Britton Book Club that has continued these many years. And the laughter — that unique mix of goofiness, creativity, and disciplined focus that is necessary to sustain an agency and to produce extraordinary work. I’m immensely proud to see such vibrancy and commitment in the faces of those who work at Grady Britton today.&nbsp;&nbsp;PAIGE CAMPBELL, CURRENT PRESIDENT AND PARTNERWhat&nbsp;goals did you have for the agency in your first year of ownership? It sounds crazy, but my goal at that time was for the agency to stay afloat. The recession hit about 6 months after signing our purchase agreement, and Andy and I had just made our down payments. We were experiencing layoffs, and our clients’ marketing budgets were in serious decline. At the time, I remember wondering if/how we were going to make it and wondering what was going to happen next.&nbsp;I know when we planned to buy the agency originally we were hoping to build on the great reputation the agency had and to prioritize our culture and clients who had a Will to be Great, but once the recession hit, my goal was to make payroll every month.How has the agency grown under your ownership? The agency has changed so much, yet at the same time, it’s true and even more committed to its roots. We’ve become larger, stronger, and deeper in capabilities — and our purpose and culture have become richer and more meaningful. We live and work in integrity each day, and it feels right. To me, it didn’t feel that way 9 years ago.&nbsp;How would you like to see Grady Britton’s work impact clients in the future? We know our strategy and work has the ability to transform our clients’ businesses. And we are committed to helping the good guys win — those special companies doing right by the world. I hope our work introduces, propels, and inspires people who are seeking more alignment and meaning in their lives. Over time, as we help organizations that are helping to create a better tomorrow grow, society will be impacted positively, and our environment and all of us will be better for it.&nbsp;&nbsp;ANDY ASKREN, CURRENT PARTNER and EXECUTIVE CREATIVE DIRECTORWhat&nbsp;goals did you have for the agency in your first year of ownership? That first year took what I had originally set as my goals for the agency and handed me completely new ones. Each month of that year, each week, each day, was about business survival. Just keeping this gem of a company that I’d fallen in love with alive and running, while still keeping the approach our work took “GB-right.” The agency had a reputation to live up to regardless of some little ol’ recession we also happened to be juggling.&nbsp;&nbsp;How has the agency grown under your ownership? To me, the agency has come into itself in a really fantastic way. It’s always had a certain “feel” to it, and an aim to do the right thing. We’ve put a lot of work into defining what made up that feeling, that sense — and then got into the nitty gritty of how we make that happen in a sustainable, tangible way with a common language. Codifying that has attracted folks who take what they do very personally; they’re wholly invested in what they can make happen for our clients and community.&nbsp;How would you like to see Grady Britton’s work impact clients in the future? People are looking for things they can believe in and support: missions, stories, actions. Businesses and brands doing good in the world can be those anchors now. And for the ones who take on that responsibility, I want to see them flood the market and own that charge. I believe GB exists to fuel that movement. I hope we continue to attract more and more clients who want the same thing, and more employees and partners who are up for that. I hope we inspire other agencies to point themselves in that direction, too.

Grady Britton Reflects on 45 Years of Doing Good

This is the best kind of news to share. We’ve chosen our two Grady Britton grant recipients for 2019/2020. Since we’re celebrating our 45-year agency anniversary and our 10-year grant anniversary, we figured that called for two winners. One has been awarded $25,000 in-kind marketing know-how. One has been awarded 150 volunteer hours from our very own Griffs.&nbsp;Both had some incredibly tough competition.Before we talk about the winners, we want to thank every nonprofit organization that applied for sharing their stories with such thought. Our internal committee got a little attached to every one of them, and narrowing the pool down was no easy feat. Many of these organizations’ missions are critical to improving quality of life. Every one of them impacts our community. And we were reminded yet again how many driven and giving people are leading this city to make it better for everyone here.After we reviewed all of the applications, we invited a handful of organizations into our office for an informational interview. Our committee got the chance to hear more about the work the applicants do, straight from them, and ask deeper questions about how the grant would ideally be used. While these interviews admittedly made the selection process that much more challenging, they were also an opportunity to make our first connection. And there was no denying the connection with our two winners.Portland’s <a href="https://www.artistsrep.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Artists Repertory Theatre</a> is the recipient of our marketing grant. <a href="https://www.tprojects.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Transition Projects</a> is the recipient of our volunteer grant.&nbsp;Founded in 1982 by local artists, <a href="https://www.artistsrep.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Artists Repertory Theatre</a> (ART) is Portland’s longest-running professional theater company. ART focuses on work by writers of color, women, trans-, and gender nonconforming writers—a contemporary theatre that addresses the issues of our time. ART is working to make theatre accessible and affordable for all audiences, and also provides programs, services, and rehearsal space to the community via the ArtsHub.&nbsp;The Grady Britton team is excited to partner with ART in the next year as they dive into these significant, exciting changes. Exactly what we’ll be doing is under wraps for now, but we can hint that it has to do with ART moving into their new space and finding ways to promote all of their services. As creators, we feel a shared ethos with the organization, and know that what’s ahead for their organization will have a dramatic impact on the community.For 50 years, <a href="https://www.tprojects.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Transition Projects</a> has helped those experiencing homelessness transition successfully into housing. By providing shelter, housing, and supportive services for very low-income people—especially veterans, women, and people with disabilities—Transition Projects assists more than 10,000 people experiencing homelessness each year. The organization operates out of 10 Portland Metro-area locations, and its programs are designed to help people survive the streets, find housing, and retain their housing.As the recipient of Grady Britton’s first-ever volunteer grant, Transition Projects will receive 150 hours of volunteer time from our team. As part of their Meal Provider Program, we’ll plan, purchase, cook, and serve about 10 meals next year in their shelter locations. We chose Transition Projects because of their comprehensive approach—from homelessness to housing—in lifting up our community. (Psst they’re always looking for volunteers, so you can apply, too.)&nbsp;In celebration of our 45th anniversary, and our 10th grant anniversary, congratulations to both of our grant winners. We also want to offer sincere, deep appreciation to every organization that not only applied, but also to those in our city striving to make lasting change. We’re proud to use our B Corp status as a continual guide—to use business as a force for good.

Two Grant Winners. Double the Impact.

Design is often subjective, but a good strategy is usually reflected in the final execution—when done well. Facebook debuted its new logo in early November, with the intent to represent the entire company and its subsidiaries, think Instagram and Messenger, among others.AdWeek collected responses from designers, asking what they thought of the new look. And while you can never be sure about the discussions that led to it, Grady Britton designer Paul Levy offered a tepid opinion.&nbsp;“While I’m not a fan of generic wordmarks, I can tolerate them when they are the primary mark for a brand. What’s particularly confusing about Facebook’s new corporate mark is that it has to co-exist with the brand mark that, presumably, will continue to live on the platform. Creating a corporate mark that doesn’t leverage, or at least pay some kind of homage to, the brand mark seems confusing, bordering upon design malfeasance.”Paul did add, however, that he imagined the designer was likely in a no-win situation.&nbsp;

Designers Side-Eye Facebook’s New Corporate Logo

We’re excited to announce the Grady Britton annual grant application is open! It’s our agency’s 45th anniversary and 10th year of grant giving. In honor of the special occasion, we’re giving more.&nbsp;This year, Portland-area nonprofits have a choice for the type of help they’d like from us. Either apply for $25,000 in-kind marketing and branding expertise, or apply for 150 volunteer hours, provided by our Griffins. Or, heck, apply for both! Just do it on time.&nbsp;You can read all about this year’s exciting addition to the grant on our brand new grant website. Apply there, too. And be sure to submit by Thursday, October 24. We’ll be closing the gates at 6pm sharp that day.&nbsp;Here at GB, our goal is to build brands for people dedicated to making the world a better place. We recognize, however, that some of the most impactful organizations in our community don’t have the means to hire an agency for an extended period of time. That’s why we developed the GB Grant, which provides an extraordinary local nonprofit with a $25,000 donation of in-kind creative services—and new this year, 150 volunteer hours.The marketing grant covers $25,000 worth of our internal time and can be applied to in-house services including branding, creative development, media planning/buying, public relations and more. New this year, we’re also awarding 150 volunteer hours to a nonprofit organization serving the greater Portland area. These hours can be applied to organizational needs, as they relate to typical volunteer activities.&nbsp;The winner(s) of this year’s grant will join a group of past winners that include LIVE, Meals on Wheels People, S.M.A.R.T, Marathon Scholars, Community Warehouse, Friends of the Columbia Gorge and others. Each winner and campaign has been unique, yet all recipients are united by their passion in serving those in their community who need help the most.

Attention Local Non-Profits! Apply Now to the Grady Britton Grant.

Putting people first is at the heart of what we do at Grady Britton. Sure, we’re a full-service creative agency that develops and expresses brands in all of their glory. We just do so through a human lens.We take pride in being a people-first brand, and working with clients and partners who are, too. It begins with who we work with, and means prioritizing brand missions — values over volume. Not only do we&nbsp;decide if a client's values align with our own agency values, but we also consider how our work for a brand will enable them to have the most impact for their business and customers. We may decide to take on a smaller client because we know our work will catapult them to do bigger things and affect change. We’ll dive deep into a new industry to understand how our client can evolutionize it.&nbsp;Ultimately, we care about a brand’s mission, just as we know the people who make purchasing decisions conscientiously do, too.People are making these decisions based on their values; they also want to feel valued. So successful marketing and advertising is about connecting with them as people — not as “audiences.” That connection, over time and trial, creates loyalty. We ensure our work with clients gets there. It’s a constant evaluation and navigation around the potential impact of our decisions, which means constant collaboration.&nbsp;We always begin with a search to understand — ethos, needs, goals. Our plan for how we can best help is never static. Just as people are inherently different, brands are as well, and a shared marketing challenge does not equate to one right answer.That’s where goodness comes in. We don't just do what we do to do great work (though that’s great, too); we do it to create strong relationships that help us learn, grow and evolve together, to impact industries and to catapult the brands hell bent on doing the right thing.It’s something we’ve been doing for 45 years, because we’ve learned that by putting people first, people do pretty amazing things. &nbsp;

What Being a People-First Brand Means

<img src="/assets/NC-beers-9.jpg" height="3457" width="5185">Portland’s creative and branding agency, Grady Britton, is excited to announce a partnership with fellow B Corporation, <a href="https://northcoastbrewing.com" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">North Coast Brewing Company</a>, supporting and bolstering the craft brewer’s PR storytelling and brand messaging efforts.Based in Fort Bragg, CA, North Coast Brewing Company is an independently-owned craft brewing company rooted in a deep commitment to sustainability and innovation within the craft brewing space.“Grady Britton and North Coast were drawn to each other because of our shared commitment to doing good and leaving today better than yesterday,” says Grady Britton President, Paige Campbell. “North Coast’s brand values and mission echo Grady Britton’s own mission and what we stand for as an agency.”North Coast Brewing Company is a long-standing B Corporation, nationally recognized as a top-tier craft brewery and a leader in sustainable farming and zero waste management. North Coast was recognized alongside Grady Britton as a <a href="https://bthechange.com/bestfortheworld/home" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">2018 Best Businesses for the World award recipient</a>, receiving praise as being a changemaker in their community and industry. The company’s work with marine research, jazz education and sustainable farming highlights its’ commitment towards doing good, one pint at a time.North Coast’s impressive beer roster is award-winning and distributed across the world. The company’s core beer brands have received <a href="https://northcoastbrewing.com/sustainability/non-gmo-project-verification/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Non-GMO project verification</a>, emphasizing its’ commitment to brewing with ingredients that are both sustainable to the earth and healthy for consumers. North Coast’s energy use for each barrel of beer is less than half the industry average, illustrating one way North Coast contributes as a leader within the craft beer market.

Grady Britton Announces Partnership with North Coast Brewing Company

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/2-Feature-image-1024x512.jpg"></figure>At Grady Britton we like to say that GB stands for getting better, because we believe that impactful and exceptional work is always work in progress. In fact, our mantra is “Leave today better than yesterday.”So imagine our surprise when we heard the news that we had been named “the best” — not the “most dedicated” or “better-est” — and not just best in something, but best for the world. That’s right: our agency was ranked on the 2018 Best for the World list in the Worker Recognition category.The Best for the World list is compiled annually by B Lab, a nonprofit organization that certifies companies for B Corporation status by evaluating business initiatives for social and environmental change. The list recognizes companies with B Impact Assessment scores in the top 10 percent globally. These are corporations making a truly meaningful impact for causes pertaining to workers, community, customers, governance, and the environment.We’re immensely humbled and honored to achieve the Best for the World distinction. Marketing and branding are what we do, but the purpose on which our work is founded, and our impact on the larger community is why we do it.<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/3-Our-why-1024x400.jpg"></figure>In terms of worker recognition and well being, we make a point creating an open, transparent, and low-stress organizational culture. Whether we’re engaging in biweekly meditation sessions, bowling on the agency team – Bowlable Hours, or having a Buoy Beer during our weekly Fridays at 4, the environment at Grady Britton looks markedly different from the high drama and burn-and-churn ethos of countless other agencies. Many of our team members have worked for marketing and advertising firms, be they large or small, that generate creative energy through intensity. We try to avoid that here, but make sure to retain the energy, passion, and smarts. We want our people to bring their whole, authentic selves to the job—and that requires getting a good night’s sleep.<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/4-Values-1024x200.jpg"></figure>Another workforce initiative I’m proud of is Grady Britton’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiative. We’ve recently established DEI benchmarks, and are encouraging candid, open, nonjudgmental conversations around diversity, equity, and inclusion at our agency. DEI is also a major component of how we hire and train new Griffins. And we’re at work in our community: engaging with, donating resources to, and forming channels for underserved groups who lack access to the industry.While we hope this people-first approach improves our ability to positively impact the world, frankly, it’s just good business. A shared focus on doing the right thing makes it easy to attract, communicate with, and build collaborative relationships with clients. Many of the companies we work with are B Corps themselves. There are fewer obstacles to creating extraordinary work when there’s a baked-in alignment of values.One of those values, as I mentioned at the top of this post, is continually striving to improve. Truth be told, this isn’t the first time we’ve been ranked as the “best.” But rather than simply congratulating ourselves and popping the champagne (which, don’t get me wrong, we certainly do), we make sure to come into work the next day determined to refine and redefine what it means to be the best. And do it better tomorrow.GB President Paige Campbell says it, well, best: “Doing the right thing is ingrained into the foundational ethos of Grady Britton. We will continue to learn and improve as we work for positive and meaningful change.”Get more information about GB’s mission and B Corp journey, and to meet the lovely people on our team.

We’ve Been Named Among the 2018 Best Businesses for the World!

Pop quiz time! Which of the following branded products recently sold out within minutes?<ol><li>$30 red clay bricks emblazoned with the Supreme logo</li><li>$110 Dunkin’ Donuts-themed Saucony running shoes</li><li>$850 platform Crocs decorated with Balenciaga pins</li></ol>Trick question—they all did. Well, actually, the Crocs sold out before they ever officially went on sale.These sell-outs probably don’t come as a surprise to anyone who follows contemporary fashion. Luxury apparel companies have played around with branding and corporate imagery on numerous occasions over the past few years. In fact, two of the brands above are notorious for it: on and off the runway, Balenciaga has taken inspiration from such far-flung places as IKEA and Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign, while Supreme collectors can add the bricks (which now go for hundreds on eBay) to their shelves of Supreme-branded crowbars, dog bowls, air fresheners, and inflatable rafts.Perhaps it was only a matter of time until brands took the same concepts in-house. Take a look at a few recent campaigns from massive players in the food and beverage industry:<ul><li>KFC launched KFC Ltd., an online shop that sold exclusive, KFC-themed apparel, accessories, and home goods. Products included pillowcases printed with Colonel Sanders’ face, chicken drumstick-patterned socks, gold necklaces that spelled out the words “finger-lickin’ good,” and—you guessed it—a $20,000 statue of a Zinger sandwich carved from meteorite.</li><li>Starburst collaborated with Project Runway season 15 winner Erin Robertson to produce an all-pink—and all pink Starburst-themed—clothing line tied in to the limited-time release of packages that only contained the pink variety of the candy.</li><li>Taco Bell and Forever 21 teamed up to launch an apparel collection that featured, among other things, bodysuits that resembled blown-up versions of Taco Bell hot sauce packets.</li><li>McDonald’s created exclusive threads to celebrate the release of a new Sprite flavor exclusive to McDonald’s stores. The line was limited to locations in Atlanta, New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, and customers had to enter a raffle to be eligible to buy the products.</li><li>IHOP dropped its “PancakeWear” collection, with branded onesies, loungewear, socks, and more. In the words of Stephanie Peterson, Executive Director of Communications at IHOP, the collection “reflects the spirit of the brand and what we see in our restaurants all the time—people in pajamas enjoying pancakes.”</li><li>Even Auntie Anne’s and Trolli have gotten into the branded apparel business, with lines of shirts, hats, sweaters, and fanny packs designed by leading artists, illustrators, and design studios.</li></ul>Clearly, tie-ins are having a moment. I’m not only talking about mass-produced tote bags, mugs, or t-shirts. It’s a high-fashion, art-forward, kitschy, campy, conceptual, exclusive, limited-run moment. And it’s paying off for the KFCs, Starbursts, and Aunties Anne’s of the world in a major way. These branded lines of apparel and other physical goods are a hit among consumers, particularly those most active on Instagram: millennials and Generation Z.According to a recent article in AdWeek:“A Mintel research study found that 41 percent of 18- to 23-year-olds are excited to buy things they haven’t seen anywhere else, and 57 percent consider themselves ‘nerds’—playing right into the branded merchandise frenzy, explained Diana Kelter, senior trend analyst at Mintel. ‘Being a nerd means you can be a nerd about Taco Bell or KFC,’ she said. ‘It’s about representing what you like. Something unique is the new cool.’Clothing lines also are a lower-risk way for brands to connect with fans without changing their products. ‘It’ll reach your core fans without disrupting the experience for the everyday consumer,’ she added.Branded clothes create an emotional attachment to the brand, noted Thomas Ordahl, chief strategy officer at Landor. ‘They have that hipster ironic thing,’ he said. ‘The brand transcends being a product; it becomes something people identify with.’”It’s worth mentioning that although branded clothing is officially A Thing, it’s not an altogether new thing. Brands have shown up in novel places to subvert consumer expectations throughout our lifetimes, and perhaps since the moment marketing was invented. Many of us remember, for instance, the blatant examples of product placement in movies of the 80s (and the parodies of product placement in the 90s). Neither are branded clothing lines unheard of: consider the hip-hop-influenced Looney Tunes shirts and hoodies that were everywhere 25 years ago, or the concert tees that first showed up 25 years before that. And, after all, what is a baseball hat?What is arguably new is the tone and scope of these campaigns. There’s an obvious self-awareness—and an absurd, memetic quality—to a Taco Bell hot sauce bodysuit or a KFC sandwich made of meteorite. Indeed, the all-pink Starburst campaign may have originated in a meme. These brands are in on the joke, so to speak, and they’re using their immense marketing resources to fully commit to the joke and push it to another level.Imagine how lucky someone must feel to own a pair of just a few thousand Dunkin’ Donuts shoes ever made. If your brand can adorn a consumer’s prized possession, you don’t need to worry about reaching that person through traditional channels—particularly if they’re an “influencer,” as so many owners of these products are. Rather than “walking billboard,” we’re now in the era of “walking retweet.”As with any marketing trend, however, the operative question is: Is this limited to the purview of big brands? Are we witnessing the inevitable marriage of fast food and fast fashion, or should everyone be thinking about launching their own branded clothing line?Consumers do like showing their loyalty to their neighborhood coffee shop, ice cream joint, or bar with a branded t-shirt, hat, or bumper sticker. And while these items are relatively easy to produce, there are a number of reasons a sustainability-minded brand might want to stay away from apparel and collectible goods.But there’s another reason I haven’t mentioned for why branded clothing is trending right now: many of these lines have benefited charitable causes. The IHOP pajamas raised funds for Miracle Network Hospitals. Sales from the Auntie Anne’s collection went toward the Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation for cancer research. And those Dunkin’ Donuts shoes were created in honor of the Boston Marathon.All of which is to say that there’s more going on here than jokes, memes, and hype. From Balenciaga Crocs to PancakeWare socks, branding has the power to aesthetically and materially change the world. Then again, depending on your brands’ values, the best way to make a difference may be to tell your audience not to buy your branded jacket.

The Weird, Chic, Instagrammable World of Branded Clothing

Last month, approximately 800,000 people took to the streets in Washington, D.C. to protest against gun violence. By some estimates, they were joined by about million more across the United States. All told, the March for Our Lives was likely one of the largest single-day demonstrations in US history, surpassing the Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam in 1969 and the Million Man March in 1996.While those protestor numbers are impressive on their own, what’s truly incredible about the current gun reform movement is the ways in which they’ve entered—and stuck around in—our daily news feeds and conversations. Emma González, David Hogg, and the other survivors of the February shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School have become familiar faces and voices in the media leading this movement. Moreover, Never Again MSD has been able to influence the passage of specific legislation, such as Florida’s new law raising the minimum legal age to purchase a firearm. Unlike the aftermaths of Columbine, Sandy Hook, Pulse, Las Vegas, and countless other mass shootings, ongoing debate and change appear to be happening. For once, political differences aside, everyone’s paying attention to the same issue.Wouldn’t it be great if climate change activists could coalesce around common goals, policy, hashtags, and specific calls to action, too?I’m not suggesting we haven’t spent decades trying. Yes, groups around the world are dedicated to promoting environmental public policy, awareness, education, and advocacy. Yes, journalists write stories every day about scientific research showing harrowing evidence of humanity’s catastrophic impact on the planet. And yes, about a million people turned out last year for another massive demonstration, the March for Science, which was largely focused on climate change.But when was the last time our movement became a trending topic? When was the last time someone told you they had changed their mind about climate change? And when was the last time the US enacted a transformative climate and energy regulation—one that might actually alter environmental practices and behavior?I’ll tell you: it was the Clean Power Plan, which the Obama Administration created in 2015… and which the Trump Administration will soon try to eliminate.It’s no wonder nonprofit and for-profit organizations have taken it upon themselves to tackle what lawmakers seem incapable or unwilling to address. Today, there are hundreds of foundations, associations, alliances, trusts, funds, conservancies, councils, coalitions, and networks (not to mention B Corporations) pursuing various, important missions related to, well, saving the world.There’s just one problem: there are hundreds of them, and they all have important, world-saving missions, but there are no coordinated messaging, goals or interest in Collective Impact. What can we as socially conscious businesses and individuals do to make a difference? And what organizations’ should we support?We’ve had several conversations about what our agency can do to keep track of the myriad climate groups and help activists understand where to focus their attention. So, to make sense of the constellation of organizations—from those that operate on a global scale to those in our backyard—we put together an infographic:I’m not going to lie, this was a tough exercise. To develop this infographic, we started out with a massive spreadsheet charting dozens of local, regional, national, and global organizations. Pretty quickly, we came across two major challenges: one, determining which groups to include; and two, determining the specific stakeholders, mission, and goals of each organization. Sure they all want to reduce global warming, but how? And how will we know if and when they’re successful? In the short term – not in 2050.We wound up picking ten organizations that we believe represent a diverse, high-quality selection for anyone seeking to address climate change today. This infographic is far from exhaustive, but hopefully it can help you navigate your journey as an activist in this admittedly overwhelming movement.Let me know what you think! And check back later in the week for Part 2 – our suggestions for things you and/or your business can do to support the climate change movement and reduce global warming.

The Ultimate Climate Change Movement Infographic: How to Know Which Organizations to Follow and Support

<a href="/assets/IMG_8798-e1518469017854.jpg" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><img src="/assets/IMG_8798-e1518469017854-768x1024.jpg" height="1024" width="768"></a>Grady Britton is pleased to announce that we took home “Best in Show” from the <a href="http://ama-pdx.org/maxawards/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">2018 American Marketing Association Max Awards</a>. Oh, and we didn’t just win any award—we won Best in Show!Best in Show for what, you ask? Well, dear and curious reader, our fellow creative professionals recognized Grady Britton for the “Journey Well” campaign we developed for Women’s Healthcare Associates (WHA). Headquartered in Portland, Oregon, WHA is the region’s foremost provider of female-focused healthcare. Since 2015, we’ve had the privilege of working with the organization on a variety of branding, social media, PR, advertising, and digital initiatives. See all of the entries <a href="http://ama-pdx.org/maxawards/award-submissions/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">here</a>.<a href="/assets/IMG_20160721_124850_1-1.jpg" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><img src="/assets/IMG_20160721_124850_1-1-1024x768.jpg" height="768" width="1024"></a>If you’re unfamiliar with the “Journey Well” campaign, here’s some background: While research showed that WHA patients adored their providers, there was little affinity for the organization as a whole. To drive these goals, we were charged with bringing the same dedication and passion of the WHA staff to life in the market. We recognized the importance of talking to women directly, without the common trap of cloying sentimentality or stereotypes. Ultimately, we wanted Portland area women to know there is a place for them—a place where they will experience the most dedicated, human, and personal healthcare imaginable.<iframe class="ql-video" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="true" src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/256161463?dnt=1&amp;app_id=122963" height="281" width="500"></iframe> We think the campaign’s results speak for themselves.&nbsp;You can read more about the campaign and our other work for WHA <a href="https://gradybritton.com/work/project/womens-healthcare-associates/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">here</a>.While winning Best in Show would have made our year regardless of the project, we’re especially honored that members of the Portland chapter of the American Marketing Association awarded this particular campaign. “Journey Well” was a true partnership with our client, Jen Norberg, and a demonstration of the brand-driven, multi-channel integrated work we do. What’s even more awesome is that the work was led by an all-female creative leadership team.<a href="/assets/IMG_8424.jpg" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><img src="/assets/IMG_8424-1024x576.jpg" height="576" width="1024"></a><blockquote>“Since our first brand discovery meeting in 2015, it was evident that this is an exceptional organization. When you work with doctors, clinicians and partners who care deeply about what they do, the communities of women they serve—and listening to one another first and foremost—it opens doors to have positive and emotional connections with women. They had the guts and smarts to recognize this and respectfully, “go there.” What a rare and beautiful thing. And now, what a poignant time to be there for women. All women.”&nbsp;</blockquote><blockquote>&nbsp;– Mary-Catherine Jones, Creative Director at Grady Britton</blockquote>Held annually, the <a href="http://ama-pdx.org/maxawards/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">AMA Max Awards</a> celebrate the best of the best work developed by marketing professionals in Portland, Oregon. We’d like to take this opportunity to thank the community for voting for our campaign, and to give a shout-out to the other attendees and award winners this year. To see them all, visit ama-pdx.org/maxawards.Time to coast for the remainder of 2018! (Just kidding.)

We Won Best in Show at the 2018 AMA Max Awards!

You’ve probably seen bright, bucolic Organic Valley labels in your stores’ dairy cases. Milk, butter, cheese, creamer, eggs. They’re right there, next to maybe a dozen or so other brands with similar organic and natural and sustainable labels.And there’s the rub. While a lot of these brands have jumped onto the bandwagon (not a bad thing at all), Organic Valley— well, they built the bandwagon. It was time to share that story.&nbsp;The year was 1988. Powerful corporations had taken near-complete control of food production in the United States. Across the country, farmland was being used for industrial agriculture, a system characterized by synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and intensive animal farming.Both in and outside of the food industry, people could see the myriad ways industrial agriculture was harming the environment, human health, and animal well-being. Concerned activists and scientists tried to warn the public that the negative impact would only worsen until humanity exhausted our natural resources. Industrial agriculture could not sustain itself.In spite of this dire forecast, the environmental movement remained at the margins of society. For most consumers, what mattered was that food was plentiful and cheap. And for farmers, it seemed that the only choice was to join the system—or find another line of work.But a small group of family farmers in the Coulee Region of Wisconsin came up with an idea: if they couldn’t survive on their own, maybe they could keep the old, environmentally sustainable method of farming alive by joining together. And so, the Coulee Region Organic Produce Pool (CROPP) Cooperative was born.Fast-forward to 2017. Nearly 30 years after its founding, the CROPP Cooperative—now called Organic Valley—has expanded into a network of 2,000 farmer-owners in 32 states (and three Canadian provinces). Today, Organic Valley is the largest farmer-owned organic co-op in the US and, with an annual revenue of over $1 billion, one of the biggest organic food and beverage brands in the world.Still, up until recently, relatively few people knew Organic Valley’s long-term roots in the category. Environmentally conscious farmers and consumers have certainly recognized the company as an agricultural leader for years. And OV’s creative, often hilarious campaigns, such as “Save the Bros,” have received millions of views, earned awards, and grabbed headlines. But for a shopper who’s unfamiliar with that work, and who may not know the difference between labels and descriptors such as “organic,” “sustainable,” and “natural,” Organic Valley has simply seemed like another brand competing for space in the dairy aisle.Recognizing this, Organic Valley came to Grady Britton with a challenge: take the annual OV sustainability report and transform it into a vehicle for publicity and brand awareness.In years past, the company has issued the report to their farmer owners, employees and a select group of highly-informed consumers—basically, people who already know what sustainability means, and who care about the minutiae of soil content and kilowatts of renewable energy produced. Our task would be to integrate the report into Organic Valley’s brand story. We would need to present the data in a way that would reach the general public; convey Organic Valley’s history and role as a sustainability champion and innovator; and explain not only what sustainable farming is, but why it’s the sole means of food production that preserves the health of our planet.In short: help a bunch of farmers save the world. Were we in? Of course we were in.We started by taking a look at the word “sustainability” and tossing out all previous associations we had with the word. Like the terms “green” and “natural,” sustainability has accrued so many meanings in recent years that it’s effectively become meaningless. For Organic Valley, however, it’s much more than a label, or a recycling program, or a commitment to “do good.” Sustainability means that what works now will continue to work a year from now, 10 years from now, and 100 years from now. It’s a set of business practices that don’t degrade the Earth and its inhabitants over the long term.The farmers who own and operate Organic Valley keep sustainability at the core of everything they do. It’s the reason they raise their cows in pastures, derive the majority of their electricity from renewable sources, keep distribution as local as possible, and never use synthetic hormones, antibiotics, or toxic pesticides. It’s the reason they’re a co-op. Organic Valley’s dedication to sustainability is so extensive it even exceeds the USDA’s rigorous organic certification standards—standards, by the way, which Organic Valley helped write.Organic Valley took the organic mindset and made it a movement. The fact that they continue to improve their organic practices on a massive scale, while offering their products at affordable prices, should impress anyone who buys dairy.But as you’ve no doubt heard by now, facts don’t convince people. And that presented us with a real challenge as we figured out how to tell the brand’s story in a way that would emotionally resonate with consumers. Organic Valley’s sustainably team gave us access to scores of metrics, which are great for improving business outcomes, but have limited value from an audience awareness and engagement standpoint… until……Until you start listening to what the data is telling you. Unlike information collected by a company focused solely on profit, Organic Valley’s data has an accountability component: it proves that farmers throughout the co-op are following the same ethos. At a time when virtually every brand is focused on authenticity and transparency, Organic Valley doesn’t have to tell the world they’re trying to do good—they are doing good, so much so that marketing is almost an afterthought.This revelation was pivotal. Those of us who work at creative agencies are trained (sometimes against our natural inclinations) to think of ourselves as in service to a brand. In this case, what we were really working for was a movement. Organic Valley is not a pyramid-shaped corporation, but a conglomerate of farmers and their families. These are the individual men and women who have joined together to provide a viable alternative to industrial agriculture.In many ways, Organic Valley’s farmer-owners aren’t that different from their intended audience. They may have more background and experience with organic food, but they’re not in it to become rich—because, if they were, they would have already sold their land to one of the few dozen processors that own most organic food brands. In a world filled with uncertainty and conflicting information about topics such as climate change, animal welfare, and what is and isn’t safe to put in our bodies, these farmers are true subject matter experts. They’re the ones who should be leading the conversation and modeling sustainability through their examples.Indeed, one of the primary reasons Organic Valley wanted to publicize this information was to promote sustainable practices in general. The individuals who are part of the co-op are demonstrating the values and characteristics of sustainable farming, while the company demonstrates what it means to adopt a sustainable business model. Their stories prove that it’s possible to stay independent and scale a company without compromising values.With all of this in mind, our job was to simply do what we do best, and bring stories to the forefront. With Organic Valley’s tagline—“Bringing the Good”—as our foundation, we pulled the stories of individual farmers and specific sustainability initiatives out of the data, and developed them into relatable, eye-catching content.The stories are available at a “Why Organic Valley” section of the Organic Valley website, just a click away from the homepage. Once the section was live, we helped circulate the launch message to consumers via a robust public relations strategy that centered around outreach to social media influencers and bloggers with food and beverage, organic, environmental, healthy eating and natural product topic focuses.In our outreach to influencers, we shared the contents and main message of the report and encouraged them to share the website using a unique hashtag. We also repurposed digital graphics and created a unique social asset package for these influencers to use, making the report and sustainability story more appealing and consumer friendly.The results astounded us. In days, the report garnered over 500,000 unique impressions across relevant blogs and social media channels, and we had a 75% response rate from publications on our media list.Clearly, there’s an appetite (no pun intended) for this kind of knowledge. Food is a basic part of human life, but our connections to it are anything but simple. Our personal beliefs and experiences are bound up in what we eat. As humans start to understand more about the impact of our agricultural footprint, we need to be willing to engage in difficult conversations about culture, ethics, science, and economics.No one has the whole picture, but if we’re willing to hear each other’s stories, we can bring our insights—and bring the good—to the next generation of farmers and consumers.

How We Helped the Organic Valley Quirky Farmers Save the World

Portland, Oregon is a great place to live if you like supporting local, minority-owned businesses. Thanks to events like My People’s Market, our city’s becoming an even better place to live for supporting and providing opportunities to local entrepreneurs of color.My People’s Market, which took place earlier in November, featured nearly 100 local multicultural vendors, as well as live music and great food (because what would a Portland gathering be without the food?) It wasn’t your typical market, more of a festival, a party, and a vibrant gathering put together by Travel Portland, Partners in Diversity, Prosper Portland, and the Mercatus Collective.&nbsp;The event celebrated local businesses and provided networking opportunities for business owners of color.We here at Grady Britton were honored to be a sponsor of My People’s Market, and we’re looking forward to supporting the future connection opportunities that Mercatus and Proper Portland’s Inclusive Business Resource Network already have planned.If you missed My People’s Market, you didn’t miss your chance to support local, minority-owned businesses. You can check out some of the highlights below—and click on any of the links we’ve included here to learn more about each brand.(PS – Consider this blog post our holiday shopping guide!)Local business: Hue Noir CosmeticsWhat it is: A local makeup brand built with multicultural women in mind. They offer 25 shades of foundation!Learn more: huenoir.com&nbsp;Local business: Amaree &amp; Reese JewelryWhat it is: Handcrafted jewelry inspired by the owners’ “love of geometric shapes, raw metals and semi-precious stones.”Learn more: amareeandreese.com&nbsp;Local business: seewhyzhangWhat it is: Self-taught artist Cathy Zhang’s shop for her gorgeous watercolor illustrations—great baby gift ideas here.Learn more: seewhyzhang.com&nbsp;Local business: Royalty SpiritsWhat it is: The first West Coast liquor company owned and operated by a black woman. Look for REX Whiskey and Miru Vodka in stores.Learn more: rex-whiskey.com&nbsp;Local business: With Love from PDXWhat it is: A custom gifting company that offers locally sourced, handmade goods.Learn more: withlovefrompdx.com&nbsp;Local business: MexiRicanWhat it is: A cocktail bar and bartending service that seeks to “reinvent a non-alcoholic Piña Colada,” by “mixing the original Caribbean Piña Colada with organic bananas and/or local blueberries.” And yes, they offer drinks in hollowed-out pineapples.Learn more: facebook.com/pg/mexiricanpinacolada&nbsp;Local business: Midred’s Sweet TreatsWhat it is: A one-of-a-kind bakery, owned by Mildred Winters Jackson, who makes an amazing sweet potato pie.Learn more: facebook.com/pg/mildredwintersjackson&nbsp;What local, minority-owned businesses would you like more people to support? Share your favorite brands with us on Twitter or Facebook. We’ll continue updating this list as suggestions come in!

Missed My People’s Market? You Can Still Support Local, Minority-Owned Businesses

<a href="/news/interns-desk-like-work-socially-responsible-agency">The last time you heard from me</a>, I was loving life as a PR intern at Grady Britton and dropping bagels in my hair. As it turns out, three months down the road I am still madly in love with my job—and still regularly dropping food in my hair/on my pants/everywhere in the office. The office dogs literally swarm under my desk because there are so many crumbs—not that I’m complaining.Moving on from my constant clumsiness… Over the past three months, I have learned so many things about agency life and working in PR. I decided to use this space to share some of the highlights with you, accompanied, of course, by GIFS from Parks and Recreation.Ready for me to drop some knowledge?<figure class="image"><img src="https://media.giphy.com/media/UmBdALbYTmCJ2/giphy.gif"></figure><ol><li>Never Stop Exploring.</li></ol><figure class="image"><img src="https://media.giphy.com/media/5yLgocAcF0DYJHZtQqs/giphy.gif" alt="Parks And Recreation Finale GIF - Find &amp; Share on GIPHY"></figure>That phrase might sound like<a href="https://images.icanvas.com/2d/LFS17.jpg"> a cliche Instagram graphic</a>, but it couldn’t be closer to home for anyone who leads the agency and PR life.I have learned that no matter how much I read, search, explore, and so on, there’s always more I need to find out and understand. I’ve always loved and valued learning. In fact, one of my biggest fears when graduating from college was that, once I made it to the real world, I would stop learning new skills and information. That is definitely not the case!For instance, I spend a good chunk of my time looking at industry and competitor news for clients, as well as advertising news for GB. Let me tell you, no matter how much I search and read there is always more for me to find and share. Don’t stop when you find one interesting thing, stay hungry to learn and find new and exciting story angles and opportunities. I promise if you keep exploring, you’ll find them.<ol><li>Don’t Limit Yourself.</li></ol><figure class="image"><img src="https://media.giphy.com/media/LSNqpYqGRqwrS/giphy.gif" alt="Happy Parks And Recreation GIF - Find &amp; Share on GIPHY"></figure>My dream has always been to work with clients in the food and beverage and hospitality and tourism industries. While I am very lucky to work with those types of accounts, being a PR intern at an agency has pushed me to learn about so many other fields outside of my comfort zone. From clients in prescription pricing to service animal organizations to handbag manufacturers, the kinds of businesses I encounter in agency life have made me realize how essential it is to broaden my horizons and dive into topics I may have never given a second thought before.Even if you’re really passionate about a certain industry, be open to others. I’ve learned some of the most amazing things from industries in which I had no experience before.<ol><li>Integrate and Collaborate.</li></ol><figure class="image"><img src="https://media.giphy.com/media/D7v65JWyrFMti/giphy.gif" alt="Parks And Recreation GIF - Find &amp; Share on GIPHY"></figure>Grady Britton is an integrated creative agency, meaning that we go beyond just being a traditional advertising or PR agency. We have a wide variety of communication and creative departments all under one roof, which makes collaboration not only easy but also necessary.If I have a marketing question, I just pop over to Senior Account manager Jill in the office next door. When I am looking into paid media, Andy and Sarah are right down the hall. If we need new creative, Ethan and Karen are just a short Razor scooter ride away. (Yes, of course we have scooters in our office).I recently worked on an advertorial for a client that utilizes both our PR and marketing services. It was mainly a marketing project, but the team asked for my help writing the piece. Doing PR is what gets me excited and up in the morning, but I learned how much my skills can improve when I work with other fields in the industry. Collaborating with people in other areas of the agency not only makes me a better PR practitioner but it also makes me a more strategic communicator overall. It can’t say enough how important it is to get the whole picture and to explore ideas and processes outside of your norm! Lo and behold, three months down the line and life as a Griffin is still exceeding my expectations. If you’re interested in learning more about all of the amazing industries and clients I discussed above, check out <a href="https://gradybritton.com/work/">our Work page.</a>Now, in true Leslie Knope fashion, I’m going to go eat some waffles and watch Parks and Rec.<figure class="image"><img src="https://media.giphy.com/media/jGtjHtIFFwZ8I/giphy.gif"></figure><figure class="image"><img src="https://media.giphy.com/media/q7iXVcV6DYsiA/giphy.gif"></figure><figure class="image"><img src="https://media.giphy.com/media/M4mWdsMaUqsSc/giphy.gif" alt="Post Collaborate GIF - Find &amp; Share on GIPHY"></figure>

From the PR Intern’s Desk (Part 2): A Story in Parks and Recreation GIFs

They’re the largest and most diverse generation in American history. And maybe the biggest target for cliched generalizations ever.&nbsp;Meet the millennials.Just look at those 20 to 30 year old,&nbsp;lazy, entitled, self-obsessed, purpose-driven, passionate, struggling, creative ignoramuses who are really good and really bad with money, can’t live without their phones (but also tend to unplug), ironically love Guy Fieri, and unironically hate Applebee’s. And although they’re killing everything, they represent our best hope for the future.The latest insight about millennials? Some people think they’re… WEIRD. Like, disturbingly weird, grotesquely weird, the weird kind of weird—the kind of weird that makes you go, “Woah, what?” or, “Wait, what’s going on?” or, “Wow, that’s really weird.”Here’s how one millennial describes it:“I am not a nihilist, but a mood of grim, jolly absurdism comes over me often, as it seems to come over many of my peers. To visit millennial comedy, advertising and memes is to spend time in a dream world where ideas twist and suddenly vanish; where loops of self-referential quips warp and distort with each iteration, tweaked by another user embellishing on someone else’s joke, until nothing coherent is left; where beloved children’s character Winnie the Pooh is depicted in a fan-made comic strip as a 9/11 truther, and grown men in a parody ad dance to shrill synth beats while eating Totino’s pizza rolls out of a tiny pink backpack. In this weird world of the surreal and bizarre, horror mingles with humor, and young people have space to play with emotions that seem more and more to proceed from ordinary life—the creeping suspicion that the world just doesn’t make sense.”Um, okay.If you read The Washington Post—or spent some time on social media last month—you may recognize that passage. It’s from “Why is millennial humor so weird?”, an article by Elizabeth Bruenig for the Post’s Outlook section. In just over 1600 words, Bruenig takes on the prodigious task of explaining the many absurdist jokes and memes that permeate the internet and pop culture like an unstoppable fungus devouring meaning from the inside-out.Millennialism, she writes, has infiltrated the world of advertising, evidenced by commercials such as Skittles’ “Bleachers” spot.<iframe class="ql-video" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/s6_cj35ZMnk?feature=oembed" height="281" width="500"></iframe> Like the “Skittles pox” dotting the teens’ skin, absurdity and dadaism have spread amongst the work of brands seeking to appeal to a younger audience. Bruenig’s not the first to notice, of course; others have pointed at campaigns created by agencies like Wieden + Kennedy, BBDO, and Droga5 for clients like Old Spice, GE, and JailBlimp—I mean, MailChimp.<iframe class="ql-video" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oeurqXWOsEA?feature=oembed" height="281" width="500"></iframe> This isn’t some niche community or short-lived industry trend. Consider those firms and clients: we’re talking about campaigns with multimillion-dollar budgets, celebrity casts, and global reach. It seems that in the current marketing landscape, weird is normal.So, doesn’t that make it no longer weird?History indicates that surreal comedy, like all forms of comedy, changes and takes on different meanings with time. The weirdness of the impossibly absurd, eerie, or bizarre starts to fade after the initial shock. It happened to the Budweiser Frogs, Burger King’s Burger King mascot, Doge, the Spongmonkeys… The list goes on. Millennials or no millennials, weirdness doesn’t stay weird—or stay in one place.<iframe class="ql-video" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/55oVPn7sFuM?feature=oembed" height="281" width="500"></iframe> Still, the Washington Post piece distinguishes this kind of weirdness as “tangibly dark,” and rife with “feelings of worry, failure and dread.” Bruenig hypothesizes, as commentators about supposedly millennial-centric phenomena often do, that the grim edge to millennial humor stems from the pervasive and historic problems facing the demographic: debt, job scarcity, loneliness, and so on. It’s the same question we’ve all been asking for years: Why are millennials so different? Anyone who has dared ask why young people aren’t buying homes, diamonds, or golf club memberships should already know the answer: baby boomers grew up in an entirely different world.Or, as the AV Club’s Randall Colburn puts it:“When the narratives they were told growing up—college matters, hard work pays off, the good guys win—turned out to be bullshit, the best way to find humor in such foundational failures was to embrace the illogical head-on. As such, an undercurrent of anxiety and resentment courses through these jokes; there’s something comforting, after all, about recognizing nonsense as others strive to search for meaning. For millennials, to acknowledge nothing means anything is really the first step toward meaning.”That may be cold comfort for marketers. How does a brand capitalize on meaninglessness? It’s no wonder 51% of millennials say they don’t prefer branded products over generic counterparts. But that’s a blog post for another day.For now, let’s remind ourselves that in an age of dramatic headlines, bold proclamations, and bleak outlooks on society, opinions are just opinions, no one speaks for everyone, and people don’t always know what they want—let alone what appeals to others.I’ll leave you with two excerpts from the comment section. Here’s one of the nearly 300 comments left on the Washington Post article:And here’s a comment posted beneath the Skittles “Bleachers” ad on YouTube:Hmm. It’s almost like some non-millennials relate to the millennial sensibility, while some members of the intended audience don’t.So weird, right?FUN FACT: In a former advertising life, GB’s ECD, Andy Askren, helped launch the Skittles tagline “Taste the Rainbow” with campaigns that were very unusual for the category–no kids, no jingles, not even any dialog! That was nearly 20 years ago, making it one of the longest running campaigns in advertising.&nbsp;&nbsp;

Marketing to Millennials? Weird isn’t All that Weird (Until it is.)

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/beer-1.jpg" alt="" srcset="https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/beer-1.jpg 727w, https://static.gradybritton.com/uploads/beer-1-237x300.jpg 237w" sizes="100vw" width="727"></figure>At the beginning of July, with immense excitement and hope, I began work as PR intern at Grady Britton. The months leading up to my new position and college graduation were spent scouring every corner of the internet for any and all PR agencies in Portland. I was determined to find an agency that fit my ungodly love for food (if you ever see me without food in my mouth or within easy reach, something is definitely wrong) and my desire to make the world a better place.I had a hard time finding an agency that did both until I found Grady Britton.I poured through the company’s website until I came across <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://gradybritton.com/about/">something</a> that made my jaw drop (and caused the cookie I was eating to fall out of my mouth). Grady Britton is a certified <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.bcorporation.net">B Corporation</a> that works with food and lifestyle brands who aim to do good in the world. Basically, this means that Grady Britton uses business as a tool to make the world better, through high standards of social and environmental performance, accountability and transparency.It was hard to imagine a place that would be a better fit. I would get the chance to work in PR with brands I love, at an agency that values social change as much as I do. This sounded like a match made in heaven.So what is it like to be a PR intern at a socially responsible agency?I get to help the good guys.As a Millennial, I have a grown up in a social media world where bad news and “fake news” lie behind almost every social media post, online article and story. Today, my newsfeeds and social media timelines are drowning in a sea of people and companies doing bad things–companies greedy for profit and fame with little to no regard for the well being of the consumers and communities they serve. As a PR undergrad at the University of Oregon, I dreaded the (what I thought was inevitable) day that I would be the one having to promote these companies filling up my feed. Once I accepted an internship at Grady Britton, I knew that day wouldn’t come *phew.*Working for a socially responsibly agency means that I get to work with the good guys, the heroes, the change-makers. Our clients–like <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://gradybritton.com/work/project/travel-portland-makers-day/">Travel Portland</a>, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://gradybritton.com/work/project/bobs-red-mill-brand-work/">Bob’s Red Mill</a> and <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://gradybritton.com/work/project/womens-healthcare-associates/">Women’s Health Care Associates</a>–share our same mission: to leave the world better than we found it. So, every day when I come to work I get a chance to change those newsfeeds drowning in negativity and help the brands that want to do good in the world stand in the spotlight.I am surrounded by people who want to make a difference as much as I do.There is nothing more motivating, inspiring and exciting than getting to come to work every day to an office full of creative people who want to make our community better. Everyone at Grady Britton truly believes in our values, they aren’t just for show on the website. Our ethics and goals truly play a role in every single thing we do. It’s incredible what can happen when you get a room full of people dedicated to being better.I am supported (even when I mess up).As a PR intern, sometimes you are going to make mistakes. Sometimes you are going to have typos. Sometimes you are going to drop a bagel and cream cheese into your hair and then onto the floor in your boss’s office during a client meeting (yes, that really happened). And that’s okay, as long as you’re trying.I was terrified to enter the workforce after hearing countless horror stories about interns being fired for making minor typos in an email, but that is far from the case at Grady Britton. Being a B Corp not only extends to our client work, but it is also an internal promise to be supportive and transparent within the agency. If I make a mistake, it’s a learning opportunity. My colleagues and supervisors walk me through the problems and give me countless tips and tricks for finding a solution. Sometimes I am given very challenging tasks, but they are never tests to see what I can do and I can always ask for help. Growth and success are so much easier when you aren’t afraid to ask for help.So, has working for a socially responsible agency met my expectations?It has wildly exceeded them. I get to do good in the world every day with incredible people and an amazing support system. Plus, we have a snack drawer. That isn’t B Corp related, but it does make me happy.—Check back on the blog next month for Part 2 of From the PR Intern’s Desk!&nbsp;

From the PR Intern’s Desk: What is it like to work for a socially responsible agency?

Email marketing gets a bad rap. Over the years, as a bunch of unsavory marketers, salespeople, and scam artists have inundated our inboxes with spam, marketers have largely begun to believe email is ineffective for their business needs. On top of that, email itself is seen as a closed system, founded in outdated design and development techniques.What many of us have missed, however, is email’s comeback over the last five years. With data driving more and more marking decisions, email has reemerged as the perfect channel for honing your messaging and achieving maximum ROI.In fact, according to email service provider Emma, 47% of marketers say email provides them the greatest ROI of any channel.At our recent “Email Lunch N Learn,” we dug into what email marketing looks like today. Our presentation provided a high-level overview of email marketing, explored the psychology of opening and acting on emails, and offered best practices derived from real-world examples.Here are four key takeaways:<h2>Email Is So Much More Than a Communication Channel</h2>Unlike your social media following or viewers of your digital ads, you fully own your email list. This means you can use your list and the data within it however you want, and you don’t have to rely on algorithms or other platforms to reach your audience. It also means that all of the data you collect from sending emails can be used in any other marketing campaigns.<h2>Marketing Emails Come in Three Forms</h2>Generally speaking, there are three kinds of marketing email marketers send: one-to-one messages, campaigns, and triggered and transactional emails. With the rise of automation, the third category is becoming critical: triggered and transactional emails generate over half of all email revenue.While campaign emails get the bulk of the attention, transactional messages such as order and shipping confirmations can be the biggest driver of conversions and revenue in your email program. Simple, automated calls to action—“complete your kit before we ship,” or “the item you’re watching is now in stock!”—can double your email sales. In fact, transaction rates for post-purchase emails were over 800% higher than for campaign emails!<h2>Just Say No to “Eblasts”</h2>Email marketing is about them, not you. The #1 mistake marketers make with email is sending out content that isn’t relevant to their audience. Relevance includes everything from the nature of the email to the way you write subject lines. Use data within your list to segment and target your audience, and only send segments emails that matter to them.There are times your whole list may want to receive the same email (e.g. when you’re announcing a new product line, or a retail business’s hours are changing), but no matter what, make sure you take the time to tailor your message to your audience.<h2>Use Best Practices, and Only Break the Rules Intentionally</h2>Walls of text, nonresponsive design, long headlines—countless brands fall prey to the don’ts of email marketing, but the masters understand there’s a time and a place for everything. We looked at several emails that don’t work next to several more that shouldn’t work but do, and analyzed the difference between not-so-good and really, really good.In short, you have to know the rules to break the rules. Do you know the best practices for content, design, and development? We have a short list inside our presentation to get you started.<h2>Get Your Copy of Our Email Presentation Delivered—Where Else?—to Your Inbox</h2>These are just a few highlights of our in-depth report on email marketing. Want to see the rest? Sign up for the Grady Britton newsletter and we’ll send our email best practices and strategy presentation to your inbox.Subscribe to our mailing list

4 Tricks Good Email Marketers Use to Grab Your Attention and Boost ROI

“Don’t it always seem to go / that you don’t know what you got ‘til it’s gone? / They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.”Is there any expression of nostalgia more evocative than the chorus of “Big Yellow Taxi?” There are the feelings of loss and resignation; the ephemeral, suddenly-happening and suddenly-over passage of time; the splendor and depth of what once was, flattened under the shiny asphalt of what now is. It’s a song with a message anyone can understand and relate to: the past was paradise, and the present is (ugh) a parking lot.Such is the weird, slippery, frequently paradoxical nature of nostalgia. The past isn’t really past until we’re nostalgic for it—and then we’re experiencing it all over again, or perhaps experiencing it for the first time, in the present. It makes us aware of the distance between then and now. We feel rooted in one moment while existing entirely in another.In effect, nostalgia adds punctuation to time. It gives shape to the stories we tell ourselves about our lives.And then, as the days and years pass, we become nostalgic for nostalgia: Remember 80s parties, where we all celebrated the music and fashion of the 80s? Remember the retro 50s aesthetic in Back to the Future? Or the swing craze of the 90s? Or Don Draper in 1960, played by Jon Hamm in 2007, using moments from his own life—that is, the life of an identity he stole—to pitch a real, nonfictional marketing campaign to Kodak? It’s like looking at a photo of a photo, or an endless series of reflections between two mirrors.<h2>The Challenge of Marketing with Nostalgia</h2>In our daily work, we recognize the power of nostalgia. We know it’s something to be wielded mindfully. Misapplied, nostalgia causes us to misremember our experiences—we recall what we want to recall, and forget what we want to forget. Overapplied, nostalgia creates that migraine-inducing, postmodern vortex: memories of having memories of having memories.But in the proper measure, a taste or glimpse or sensation of the past is like a hug from grandma or the smile of a lost love. It reminds us of what’s important. It tells us who we were and who we are.It would be wrong to say we’re explicitly thinking and talking about all this psychology when we’re making stuff here at Grady Britton. Moreso, the tension and questions around nostalgia sit in some corner of our shared subconscious. It circles back to a theme we’ve explored time and time again on this blog: authenticity. What does an authentic experience of nostalgia look, feel, sound, smell, and taste like? How do you hopefully make someone feel like a kid again without beating them over the head with it—this is supposed to be nostalgic, damnit?<h2>Bringing Nostalgia Back to&nbsp;Expo West 2017</h2>It was with all of this philosophical mumbo-jumbo, a lot of care and late-night conversations that led us to develop our backward-looking, forward-looking Expo West 2017 take-home swag:&nbsp;Say “hello” to our viewfinder.As a follow-up to last year’s boxes of prepaid flip phones, we gave out handcrafted stereoscopes modeled after the View-Master toys you may have looked through as a kid in the 60s, 70s, 80s, or 90s. Each “viewfinder” came preloaded with a seven-image reel featuring quotes from our clients and role models, alongside a mini sample of our work. All focused on the necessity and beauty of simplicity in natural and organic food and beverage marketing.Our anthem of simplicity and things as they should be.At an event where a few exhibitors conducted (admittedly very cool) tours of farms in virtual reality, we had something much more analog, but no less immersive. Each of the seven frames that made up the slides were rendered in 3D: certain elements “pop out,” while others appear to recede. It’s an old-school effect with new-school sensibility.The response we received was overwhelming. In the land of endless booths, florescent lights and lots and lots of networking, Expo West attendees were surprised and delighted with the simplicity of the viewmasters. They loved clicking through the images and watching each 3D frame shift in and out of focus. People told us the experience filled them with memories and nostalgia, even if they had never had the chance to use a stereoscope during childhood.Above all, our goal was to give people the experience of being a kid again—the thrill of figuring something out for the first (or fiftieth) time, the tactile pleasure of playing with a toy, the joy of reconnecting with something you thought you’d forgotten. We believe it’s an experience worth feeling nostalgic for.–Want to check out the&nbsp;viewfinder&nbsp;for yourself? Stop by our office sometime&nbsp;to snag one of the few we have left.&nbsp;&nbsp;

Hitting the Right Balance of Nostalgia and New: Getting Back to Simplicity in Natural Food and Beverage Marketing

Want to think like an award-winning creative director? Take a bathroom break.At our live&nbsp;“Have a Nice Idea” podcast recording for Design Week Portland 2017, Anne Elisco-Lemme told Grady Britton’s Andy Askren about how she makes brilliant ideas happen:&nbsp;“I go to the bathroom. I’m not kidding you!”Anne, who serves as Executive Creative Director for Duncan Channon, knows that “sometimes, you have to walk away from the problem.” Early on in the recording, she told Andy a story about hitting a wall during a client project with her then-creative partner (and agency co-founder) Parker Channon:“I said, ‘I’m going to go the bathroom, and when I come back, I’m going to have a really great idea.’ And I didn’t expect to come back with a great idea, but I came back with a really fucking great idea. I was like, ‘I’ve got it!.’ We pitched this piece of business with this idea that literally came out of nowhere.”It’s not just bathrooms: “Showers, too. Something with water coming and going. It’s flowing, right? It’s all flowing.”Anyone familiar with Duncan Channon will recognize the defining characteristics of the company’s work—a refreshing sincerity, a blunt sense of humor—in its senior creative decision-maker. Anne is a one-of-a-kind creative thinker who believes the quality of an idea depends on how it’s sold to the client, and that the shortage of women in the industry has as much to do with systematic exclusion as it does with one’s ability to crack a period or fart joke.Over the course of an hour, Anne shared her insights and experiences gained from a career in marketing. Topics included Anne’s path from art director to ECD, her involvement Duncan Channon’s campaigns for Kona Beer, her love of a good creative brief, her childhood experiences huffing markers, why she thinks every marketer should take an improv comedy class, and her advice for young professionals just getting their start.Here are a few of our favorite moments from the conversation:<h2>On the Challenges of Recognizing and Presenting Good Ideas</h2>How does Anne know when an idea is going to work? “I 100% get a feeling. Since [my early days in] this business, I would feel it in my stomach. I would get this really excited knot.”Anne told us she’s “always been a fan of the simplest work, because problems are so complex that any time somebody can take an idea and get down to the essence, there’s something really human.” She also spoke with Andy about the difficulty of communicating an idea to someone who wasn’t part of the original brainstorming session in the shower:“I have seen really great ideas die because people could not present them. I’ve seen teams almost seem bored with their work. If you’re bored when you’re presenting it, everyone else in the room is going to be bored, too. … I love when people go act out their ideas. A lot of creatives who have done improv are so great at selling their work. You have to be willing to be vulnerable and put yourself out there.”As she’s grown older and moved into higher-ranking agency positions, Anne has started thinking less about how talented people come up with good ideas, and more about how those ideas are sold during meetings. Often, she said, a marketing presentation is the best part of a client’s day—and creative professionals need to respect that:“You’ve got clients who are dealing with all sorts of numbers, distribution problems—business school stuff—but when they come sit in a room and have creative ideas pitched to them, they love that. When you come in as a creative and you’re not bringing it, it’s disappointing. It’s a huge missed opportunity.”<h2>On Duncan Channon’s Ads for Kona Brewing</h2>Kona Brewing Company, a brewery based in Kailua-Kona on Hawaii’s Big Island, is one of Duncan Channon’s prominent clients. You may be familiar with DC’s TV spots for Kona, in which two wry Hawaiian brothers educate US Mainlanders on island culture.The campaign’s exceptional longevity and performance among viewers are largely due to Anne’s creative direction. Originally, however, she wasn’t part of the project:“There was a team that was assigned to Kona. And it’s beer, right? So it’s two dudes—an all-male team. I drink beer, I like Hawaii, but I wasn’t on it. For whatever reason, these creatives could not land the campaign that the client was buying. Parker Channon came to me—and I wasn’t creative director at this point—and said, ‘Would you just throw some ideas in the ring? Just help us get there?’ I said, ‘yeah, yeah, I’ll toss you guys some ideas.’“But in my head, I was like, ‘I’m fucking stealing this campaign from these guys. Dudes, the client flew you to Hawaii, and you had a boondoggle, and you went from island to island to learn about Hawaiian culture, and you haven’t sold one yet. I’m going to steal this because I’m going to go shoot this goddamn campaign in Hawaii.’“I was reading the brief—and the brief was really brilliant—and I was listening to what the client was saying, and I thought, ‘The answer’s right here. It is not that hard.’”<h2>On Finding Success As a Woman in a Male-Dominated Industry</h2>Although Anne grew up with a father in advertising—she “was huffing [art department] markers as a seven-year-old”—she never expected to end up in the industry herself.“I didn’t know what I was going to do when I grew up,” she said. “And I wish more kids didn’t know what the hell they were going to do when they grow up. Because, frankly, I don’t think you really know until you’re a grown-up, and even then sometimes you’re like, ‘maybe I’ll go do something else.’”Nonetheless, after dabbling in music, film, and fine arts, Anne took a job in marketing so she could afford more than the single slice of pizza her daily budget allowed. She soon started rising through the ranks and, despite her lack of female colleagues, found people to model herself after:“There was this badass female director who ran the agency, and I loved being under her. … [One day] I said, ‘Do you ever feel like you’re a fraud? Do you ever feel like everybody’s so cool, and you’re the dork in the creative department? I feel like I don’t belong.’ And—this is my favorite thing anyone’s ever said to me—she said, ‘The good ones always think they’re frauds.’”Reflecting on her success, Anne credited another role model—one closer to home:“I really do think that a lot of my drive comes from my mom. This is going to sound ridiculous, but I swear to God: until I was in my teens, I thought I was the smartest person in the world. My mom would tell me all the time that I was the smartest person in the world; I bought that one hundred percent. It wasn’t until we were taking SATs in high school that I realized, ‘Holy shit—I’m not even the smartest person in this high school.’ But I really felt like I could do anything. I always felt that I could do and say what I wanted. She would tell me that, verbatim: ‘You can do whatever you want to do.’ So, when I become a female creative, not doing it wasn’t even an option.”<h2>On Her Role at Duncan Channon, and Advice for Younger Creatives</h2>These days, Anne has become a mentor herself. Looking back on her career, she told us she finds a great deal of fulfillment in her job, even though it was initially hard to give up what she loved doing:“I came to realize that there was a lot of satisfaction to having the people who work under me be better than I ever was. You let go of the ego and then it’s all about becoming a mentor to somebody. … I really love helping creative teams find the best part of their idea.”What’s next for the ECD whose agency Ad Age named 2016 Small Agency of the Year? Anne remarked that she’s “been at DC longer than most people should be at any one agency, which is something I’m really proud of and maybe something I’m really ashamed of at the same time.” An audience member mentioned that comment during the Q&amp;A portion of the evening, and asked Anne what’s kept her at Duncan Channon and whether she ever feels the “itch” to move on.“It never wasn’t working out, but the itch never goes away,” Anne said. “That doesn’t mean I’m leaving DC, but I think as creative people, we’re always thinking ‘what if’: ‘What if I go there? How would that change my life?’ … [It’s something] I would certainly say to any creative: don’t get comfortable. That’s probably when I talk about regret, it’s that I got comfortable. What I had to do is get myself uncomfortable again.”Anne encouraged the creatives in our audience to go to events, introduce themselves, and try out different jobs. Her other piece of advice? Don’t spend all your time at work:“You have to go live your life. Our job is to understand and be empathetic enough to have somebody want to act based on what we put out in the world. If you’re not out there living your life and understanding people and understanding yourself, how do you do this job? …&nbsp;It doesn’t matter how long you work. It matters what you bring to the table.”

Highlights from our Live Design Week Portland 2017 Recording of “Have a Nice Idea” Podcast with Duncan Channon ECD Anne Elisco-Lemme

Well, we sure can.Following a win at last fall’s AMA MAX Awards for best print/outdoor campaign, we were thrilled to watch our client, the Oregon Coast Aquarium, take home the Oregon Outstanding Advertising Award from the Oregon Tourism Commission.Officially, the Oregon Outstanding Advertising Award commends superior, creative advertising communication, regardless of budget size or medium. According to the Commission, “award recipients are outstanding examples of professionals who, by virtue of their vision, perseverance and dedication, are a credit to Oregon’s tourism and hospitality industry.”Unofficially, we just like to think that Oregonians love them some jellyfish and cute sea otters.The fully integrated “Sea Spectacular” campaign poked the funny bones of parents and their kids via highly visible print, billboard, and transit placements on routes between Portland and Newport. The more than 32 million impressions the campaign generated over five short months helped us reach 85% of our target audience—and brought some marine wildlife to the wild streets of downtown Portland.We’re honored to have helped the Aquarium net the award, and would like to recognize Director of Marketing Lance Beck for his affirmative and thoughtful leadership throughout the campaign. We’d also like to take this opportunity to send a shout-out to our brilliant collaborator, William Anthony, who shot the photos we used for the campaign. As a marine mammalogist who worked with the Aquarium during its first two years in business, William lent a singular perspective and level of expertise to the project.Most of all, we’d like to applaud our slippery, whiskery, colorful, gill-bearing models—who not only inspired the work, but took time out of their busy schedules to let us capture their portraits. Seriously, we couldn’t have done it without them. As our creative director Mary-Catherine Jones said:“We wanted to show people that education doesn’t have to be boring. Through our work with the Aquarium, we got to see that the animals have their own personalities and fascinating truths. Simply bringing those to life made our jobs easy, and we got to work with a client that understood how to tie those facts to culturally relevant tidbits to delight parents and kids alike.”

Can Jellyfish Blush?

You know Anne Elisco-Lemme. You know Anne Elisco-Lemme even if you don’t know Anne Elisco-Lemme.You know her from her work, which includes campaigns for Kona Brewing, Kettle Foods, Esurance, Lake Tahoe, and the California Tobacco Control Program. You know her agency, Duncan Channon, as a 2016 Ad Age Small Agency of the Year.&nbsp;And you know her from her brand-relaunching, straight-talking, self-trolling, trend-bucking, ghost-conjuring, no-time-to-explain approach to creativity and communication.&nbsp;So you know we had to get Anne on the “Have a Nice Idea” podcast. What you didn’t know is that she’ll be joining our&nbsp;Executive Creative Director Andy Askren for a special live recording of the show for Design Week Portland 2017.“I’m super excited to be speaking with Anne in a couple weeks,” says Andy. “She is one of those award-winning creatives who doesn’t have to claim the spotlight to be a badass. To me, that tells me something about her as a confident, creative person. I’m particularly interested in what others can learn from her experience.”On Thursday, April 27th, join us as we get to know Anne (maybe even yourself) better through an evening of conversation, drinks, and—of course—ideas. It’s ECD plus ECD in a West Coast marketing and creativity cocktail with personal and professional insights shaken and stirred and served straight up.&nbsp;We’ll talk about things like Anne’s meteoric rise from Duncan Channon Art Director to its creative lead, earning last year’s Ad Age honor, the art of keeping client relationships healthy, what leads women to drop out of the industry as they get older, and the importance of maintaining a rich life outside of the office. Oh, and Duncan Channon’s new logo, which the agency swiftly and soundly belittled before the internet had a chance to.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Get the details, and check out some of Duncan Channon’s work, below:<h2>The Details</h2>RSVP: RSVP for Grady Britton’s Design Week Portland Event online.Price: Tickets are $10 and we have a limited capacity, so grab your spot now!Where: Grady Britton, 107 SE Washington St, 3rd floor, Portland, Oregon 97214When: Thursday, April 27 at 5pm PDTWhat: A live recording of Have a Nice Idea podcast, featuring Anne Elisco-Lemme, the executive creative director of Duncan Channon. Special thanks as always to audio partner Digital One.<h2>About Duncan Channon</h2>San Francisco-based Duncan Channon works with ambitious organizations wanting more and better for their brand and business. Amid analytics-smoothed sameness, the 2016 Ad Age Small Agency of the Year helps organizations unearth, unfurl and unleash truly distinct identities.<h2>About Have a Nice Idea</h2>GB’s ECD, Andy Askren, started “Have a Nice Idea” to record conversations with some of the creative world’s best to learn what keeps them in it and how great work gets to be that way. “Have a Nice Idea” interviews focus on the individual in whose hands, heart, or head a transformative idea started, and what motivates creatives to create.Previous episodes have featured Glenn Cole (72andSunny), Joe Staples (Wieden+Kennedy), Jelly Helm (Studio Jelly), JD Hooge (Instrument), Danielle Trivisonno (POSSIBLE), and Tracy Wong (WONGDOODY). Available at haveaniceidea.com, SoundCloud and iTunes.

Design Week Portland 2017: Join Grady Britton for a Live Recording of “Have a Nice Idea” featuring Duncan Channon ECD Anne Elisco-Lemme

What if every decade, we could cut carbon emissions in half?What if the fossil fuel emissions from cities, nations and industry peak in 2020 and fall to zero by 2050?What if responsible business leaders banded together to commit work collaboratively on not just minimizing global warming, but also reversing it?Wouldn’t that be awesome?Yesterday, the Trump administration signed and set in motion an executive order to reverse and rewrite the Clean Power Plan and renege on the Paris Agreement. Despite today’s rollbacks being excruciatingly disappointing and galactically frustrating, I’m actually hopeful.Hope is not an emotion I expected to feel about climate change&nbsp;at any point in the near future. And yet hope is&nbsp;exactly what I felt after attending the inaugural Climate Day hosted by New Hope Network and the newly formed Climate Collaborative at Expo West in early March.Laura Dickinson, one of the founders of the Climate Collaborative, eloquently proposed a solution for brands and companies in the natural products industry to join&nbsp;together to work on the big opportunities and make a big difference. In a recent blog post she stated that “[a]lthough climate change is one of the biggest threats humankind has ever faced, it’s also one of the greatest opportunities we’ve ever had to innovate and make change. By joining forces, we can unleash a new wave of innovation that will help slow and ultimately reverse climate change while improving our quality of life and making our businesses stronger.”The Climate Collaborative seeks for manufacturers, retailers, distributors, brokers, suppliers and other concerned businesses in the natural products industry to join together and work collaboratively in taking bold action to reverse climate change. Participating businesses commit to take action on one or more of nine innovative and practical climate solutions. Companies that have already committed to the Climate Collaborative include our client Organic Valley, as well as B Corp friends Dr. Bronner’s, Lotus Foods, Numi Tea, Plum Organics, and Happy Family—plus, yours truly, Grady Britton.In his Climate Day keynote, Paul Hawken, executive director of Project Drawdown, explained that “no industry has a bigger impact on climate change than agriculture and food, both as a source of the problem and as a solution.”Hawken’s hope-filled keynote focused on the research and conclusions of Project Drawdown maps, measures, and models, and described the 100 most substantive solutions to global warming. His amazing findings provided a glimpse into which solutions have the greatest carbon impact and ability to improve lives, create jobs, restore the environment, enhance security, generate resilience, and advance human health.This list of the solutions, to be released in April, presents an extensive array of impactful measures that, as I write this, organizations are already undertaking. Out of 100 total solutions evaluated, the top ten included regenerative agriculture, reducing food waste, family planning and educating girls and women. All very doable today.&nbsp;Yesterday, in fact.As climate change activists, it’s important to remember our role in imagining and shaping the future we want to achieve. Joel Makower, the moderator for Climate Day, recently wrote in an article for Greenbiz that it’s easy “in today’s divisive and toxic political environment, to view Project Drawdown as too good to be true, a quixotic quest for an unattainable goal.But there’s something simple and sane about Project Drawdown’s collective ingredients: unabashed optimism tempered by sharp-pencil calculations, a bold goal undergirded by scientific pragmatism, immediacy coupled with a 30-year horizon, all leveraging the wisdom of a very smart crowd.”I agree. I can’t wait to be a part of the natural products industry’s momentous effort to leverage its power and passion for the greater good. If government isn’t going to do the right thing, businesses can. And this makes me hopeful.Note:&nbsp;On April 20th, Ecotrust&nbsp;will welcome Paul Hawken for a conversation about Drawdown and book signing during Earth Week. If you can make it, don’t miss it.

Why I’m Hopeful the Natural Products Industry Can Reverse Climate Change

<h5>SOURCE: DEAR CLIMATE #BF2&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;info, downloads + instructions @ dearclimate.net</h5>&nbsp;Today’s conversation around climate change is marked by deep political divisions that have seemingly stalled action. Scott Pruitt, EPA’s new administrator has cited more than a few blatant alternative facts about the science behind climate change. He’s even designated a chief of staff who threw a snowball on the floor of the US Senate to dispute that climate change exists. Both men are encouraging dissenting opinions on science-based data collected by numerous sources over the course of several decades.Despite vehement denial by our new environmental “leaders,” more than 70 percent&nbsp;of Americans do believe that the climate is changing. And yet our beliefs, attitudes, policy preferences, and behaviors vary as much as the weather between Tucson in August and Buffalo in January.So, what action can we – as consumers and brand leaders – take, knowing that there’s likely less than a snowball’s chance in hell that we’ll see any government action to minimize climate change in the near future? That’s the question that natural and organic product industry leaders will be pondering at next week’s inaugural Climate Day at Expo West 2017.&nbsp;Below are a few considerations for how we, as a collective, might be able to create positive momentum.<h2>1. Re-craft the Messaging and Language Around Climate Change</h2>It will be important to deploy a new set of vocabulary that re-frames the issues surrounding climate change in order to build trust and translate common ground issues. This common narrative should serves to correlate conservation with human values, mitigate preconceived ideas, and reduce ideological barriers regarding the environmental movement.&nbsp;To really mobilize individuals to reduce climate change, we need to shift the culture and behavior of people, businesses, schools, nonprofits, and government agencies (AKA everyone!). First, we have to acknowledge that people have different levels of concern, and different motivations to live well and consume sustainably.We also know that to create lasting change, we need to move people through different stages of involvement. These stages will require succinct (and repeated) messaging, as well as compelling art and visuals. People do not change their behavior or their minds based on facts alone (thanks, confirmation bias), but compelling messaging and engaging creative can move them to listen, learn, and adapt.<h2>2. Engage People in Fun and Provocative Ways</h2>What does a new way of talking about the weather look like? Consider Dear Climate. According to the project’s website:&nbsp;“We wanted a different vocabulary from the one we were hearing from the “survival community”: instead of crisis and catastrophe, we wanted the familiar and ordinary; instead of desperation and heroism, playfulness and friendliness. Instead of imagining mass movements or calling for community action, we were interested in finding a more personal relationship to climate change. Remembering the Sixties slogan, “the personal is political,” we wondered if the politics of climate change had evaded the personal for too long?&nbsp;Of course we were well aware of the emphasis on personal responsibility in the environmental movement—the injunctions to practice simplicity, recycle paper and plastic, avoid waste, and reduce consumption.”The Psychology of Climate Change Communication details many of the biases and barriers to scientific communication and information processing. It’s a useful tool and thought-provoking guide, but key to its messaging is a vision of hope that speaks to people’s emotional understanding of the issue while building in evidential information.<h2>3. Leverage Food Tribes</h2>Food movements such as Buy Organic, B Corps, the Rainforest Alliance (follow the frog), the Environmental Working Group’s Dirty Dozen List, and vegetarianism and veganism have moved the needle on perceptions of how diet, health, and the environment are interconnected. But more can be done.&nbsp;We should consider messaging tactics that leverage the organizational capabilities and influential power of brands, retailers, suppliers, brokers, and&nbsp;concerned consumers. In addition to traditional vehicles of paid and earned media, we should consider other fun ways to engage, inspire, and educate. More specifically, we need to inspire those who are not already alarmed, concerned, or cautious about climate change to make personal choices that positively impact them, their families, their communities, and the planet.It’s important to recognize that, for the average consumer, climate change can seem overwhelming. As environmental advocates, we need to emphasize how the choices we make every day about what we eat, how we heat and cool our homes, what transportation methods we use, and what we buy and throw away make up more than half of all local carbon emissions. We each have an important role to play, and it starts with small actions.Here are a few things everyone can do today to be a climatarian.<ul><li>Buy local</li><li>Buy organic</li><li>Work to reduce food waste</li><li>Consider eating meat in moderation</li><li>Practice yoga (really!)</li></ul>While global warming represents one of the greatest challenges facing our world, it also presents one of our greatest opportunities for innovation and leadership. The Natural Products Industry has been a leader in animal welfare, non-GMO, organic, and fair trade. Now it’s time to lead on climate.

Be the (Climate) Change You Want to See

As of January&nbsp;18, 2017, over 434,000 conservative news readers have signed a petition against Kellogg’s—not motivated by anything related to the company’s ingredients or manufacturing practices, but in opposition to its advertising choices. Nearly half a million consumers are angry that a brand is choosing not to advertise to them via their preferred newsite.The controversy started when Kellogg’s announced it was pulling its ads from Breitbart.com. Speaking to Bloomberg, a Kellogg’s spokeswoman explained the brand wouldn’t work with any websites that weren’t “aligned with [their] values as a company.”Normally, this kind of dispute would take place behind the scenes, over emails and phone calls between executives and media buyers. But Breitbart has refused to accept Kellogg’s decision quietly and the news site has responded with an online boycott, making the issue even more public. According to the #DumpKelloggs petition page, Kellogg’s has committed a “disgraceful act of cowardice … discrimination and intense prejudice” in order to “placate left-wing totalitarians.”To anyone who doesn’t frequent Breitbart but is familiar with its political leanings, this language may seem borderline comically hypocritical. The news site—founded by right-wing commentator Andrew Breitbart and formerly managed by Donald Trump’s chief strategist Steve Bannon—has run headlines such as “Young Muslims in the West Are a Ticking Time Bomb,” “Big Trans Hate Machine Targets Pitching Great Curt Schilling” and “There’s No Hiring Bias Against Women in Tech, They Just Suck at Interviews.”Breitbart’s proponents see the site an antidote to what they consider the overly “politically correct” mainstream “liberal media,” as they call it, which they claim shames and silences dissenting viewpoints. Opponents, meanwhile, see a news organization that encourages hate speech, spreads misinformation under the guise of journalism, and avoids ethical culpability by blaming the populations it victimizes.But however you feel about Breitbart, we’re all seeing some alarming trends following November’s results: echo chambers, extreme bias in media consumption habits, and, a seeming inability to address and see past our own biases by engaging in open dialogues. As Trump’s victory in the 2016 US presidential election signaled to so many of his non-supporters, the definition of a “trusted news source” has perhaps become diluted.&nbsp;According to the Pew Research Center more adults are getting their news on social media more than anywhere else. This signifies a lack of exposure to diverging opinions which is why, so often, it seems we live in an opinion bubble. The trend to&nbsp;consume only the information we choose to follow often supports only our already-formed opinions.In this extremely politically charged climate, can a brand like Kellogg’s take a stand for what it believes is right without excluding specific audiences? How do you avoid a Breitbart-style boycott while explicitly choosing not to affiliate with any groups who don’t share your values?We ask these questions of ourselves and our clients not simply because we want to avoid negative publicity. We also believe that every brand has a responsibility to participate in conversations with customers and stakeholders whose lives are impacted by the brand’s business. And as a certified B Corporation, we understand the important role a for-profit company can play in supporting social and environmental rights. Like Kellogg’s, we always strive to make sure we don’t undermine the values we stand for. At the same time, it’s clear that the wrong marketing or PR move can have the opposite of its intended effect and reinforce the walls of our personal echo chambers.The tension between making a stand and making an enemy frequently bears on our work for the companies we serve. It’s a delicate balance, and achieving it isn’t always easy. For instance, as we were coming up with new branding and content for Women’s Healthcare Associates, we faced a messaging challenge: How could the healthcare provider best communicate its commitment to all women, regardless of identity, background or political beliefs? Is it even possible to speak to such a diverse population, during an incredibly heated and politically charged time?Our answer: YES. Tasked with creating a social media message that spoke to the organization’s broad base of supporters, we helped WHA emphasize shared values like tolerance and love. What we learned is that building a community is not a question of who to exclude, but who to include. It’s one of those well-worn truths that sounds trite until you realize you see it in action every day.Inclusive brands emphasize positive impact. They have a oneness of purpose. They define themselves in the affirmative: “This is who we are and this is what we want to accomplish.”The same is true for anyone seeking to make a change. As creatives, we have the capabilities and experience to help companies tell and spread compelling stories. As a brand, you have the opportunity not only to build your audience, but to challenge your audience’s assumptions, broaden their perspectives and affirm their truths. Consumers look toward companies for answers to problems in their lives and communities. Accept that responsibility and you just might inspire others to follow your lead.You have the choice between standing for a cause or standing against whoever disagrees with you. One choice may result in a boycott. The other can build a bridge.

Engaging in Political Action as a Brand: Rising Above the Noise Without Alienating Consumers

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/customer-journey-blog-post-1-1024x496.png" alt="customer-journey-blog-post-1"></figure>In the current world of marketing, everything is about your audience. We see it in brands’ and advertisers’ focus on personalization and targeting, including hypertargeting. One element all of these things have in common is that they identify who your audience is, but what does your audience do?To answer that question, you need to develop a customer journey. Every single interaction your audience has with marketing, sales and customer service affects how consumers feel about you. A customer journey looks at these interactions and sentiments, mapping out customers’ behaviors when interacting with your brand.That may sound overwhelming. For many brands of various sizes, it can be hard to keep everything top of mind. It may also be difficult to keep them in perspective when you have a big, modern marketing machine running 24/7 on numerous channels, each with its own metrics and optimizations.When a brand spends too much time and effort in the tactical execution on a channel level, the company runs a real risk of optimizing itself out of its audience. This is especially true if you measure each channel only by conversion or revenue. A direct mail piece giving a customer 30% off their purchase might be the best-converting and most revenue-generating ad. But, it may also bring in customers who are only shopping based on price, and will move on if a competitor gives them a better deal.That’s why we need customer journeys: to understand how customers move through their decision-making processes, and to define how each marketing channel fits into that lifecycle. If you can map out a customer’s journey, you’ll have a better understanding of your customers’ mindsets and needs, and how your marketing efforts can better serve those needs.<h2>Getting Started</h2>Customer journeys may involve as much art as science, but they do require some data collection upfront. To get started, dive into your analytics accounts, social media data, email metrics, SEM programs—anything that can help you see the big picture. Where do you notice people converting at the highest frequency? Which channels drive lots of clicks, but little revenue? Look for any unusual or unexpected information.The second step is talking with your customers. Find out what they were thinking and feeling when they made their decisions to buy from you. What challenges did they face? What did they feel like immediately after the purchase? What did they feel three months later? Once again, keep an open mind and you may encounter some surprises.<h2>Constructing Your Customer Journey</h2>Armed with data, you’re ready to build your journey. There are as many ways to construct customer journeys as there are people making them, so your unique methodology may differ from what you read below. Use this as a guide and adapt it to your own particular business:<h3>Step 1: Identify Your Customers</h3>Unless you’re selling a single product to a very niche market, you probably have at least two or three distinct types of customers. Use the data and interviews you’ve gathered and divide your audience into groups. Be specific but not too granular. The smaller the distinctions between groups, the less their journeys will deviate from each other. That means more work with less payoff. For instance, “Weekly Purchaser” and “Yearly Purchaser” are likely better categories than “Women 20-22 years old” and “Women 23-24 years old.” If you have a customer group that you’d like to cater to, but don’t currently, add them to this list as well.<h3>Step 2: Map Out Their Buying Phases</h3>Map out the phases in each customer group’s life cycle. A phase should be distinct from the others and include specific actions that separate it from the phases before and after. A generic lifecycle might look like: Discover, Research, Purchase, Retain, Evangelize.<h3>Step 3: Find the “Shifts”</h3>This is the hardest step by far. It’s also the step in which your interviews and data are going to help the most. For every phase, ask yourself: What will move a customer along to the next one? Where are the barriers? What pain points exist in your own process? What actions signal movement from one phase to the next? Keep in mind that customers will often move backwards in the process.I like to chart it all in a table to keep it organized. Here’s an example of what this might look like:<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/customer-journey-blog-post-chart1-1-1024x536.png" alt="customer-journey-blog-post-chart1-1"></figure><h3>Step 4: Match Each Phase to a Channel</h3>This step defines which channels best align with each phase of the customer lifecycle. Here’s another table that might help you visualize the relationships:<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/customer-journey-blog-post-chart2-1024x682.png" alt="customer-journey-blog-post-chart2"></figure>By defining each channel’s role in the process, you’re also identifying what metrics make sense for each. For example, you might want to measure conversion for any content used in the Research and Retain phases, but not necessarily for Discover and Evangelize. As a result, you could decide to run multiple campaigns on every channel—each campaign with specific targeting and goals.<h3>Step 5: Drill Down</h3>Once you’ve wrapped up the necessary&nbsp;high-level thinking, your final step is to tweak and refine the details. All phases and channels may have their own individual journeys, which you can map out, using the overall journey as a guide. For example, if you’re mapping the journey for a website, you could create a journey for each page if necessary.<h2>Visualize and Win</h2>The output of this work should be something visual that can be shared around your organization. It’s important to make your visual clear and easy to understand. Leave out any data that isn’t absolutely critical. Most likely, not all of the information you’ve mapped will make it into the final product you present to your organization.Designers and agencies can help put all of this into context, if you have the resources to enlist their services. Since that’s not always an option, here are a few simple templates.<h3>1. The Sample Journey</h3>If a certain group of people (like a board of directors) needs to see the customer journey but won’t be referring to it on a daily basis, this is a great method for illustrating the output of the work. This is a specific journey that includes every phase and touch points—think of it as a map of your ideal customer:<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/Screen-Shot-2016-12-07-at-9.57.47-AM-1024x283.png" alt="screen-shot-2016-12-07-at-9-57-47-am"></figure><h3>2. Nesting Dolls</h3>This visual maps out multiple journeys mapped based their granularity. Each journey gets more specific than the one previous. You may find this visual helpful for defining channel flows, movement through a website, or whenever you have too much information to fit into one visual.<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/Screen-Shot-2016-12-07-at-9.57.58-AM.png" alt="screen-shot-2016-12-07-at-9-57-58-am"></figure><h3>3. The Fire Hose</h3>This is the one visual to rule them all. It’s everything all in one place—who cares if it’s the size of a whiteboard? Seriously. Remember how I just said to make it simple? Well, if you’re really enterprising and need to communicate every last detail, ignore my advice and get to work. This is a great visual to print out in massive dimensions and hang in the meeting room in which you do your planning.&nbsp;Looking for Fire Hose samples? This visual is too big to include here. Instead, I recommend doing a Google image search—you’ll find plenty of inspiration.There it is,your customer journey: a living, breathing representation of your customers that goes way beyond personas or segments. Use it when you make marketing decisions, or when launching new products and revisit it from time to time to make sure it still aligns with your strategic goals.<h2>Happy mapping!</h2>

Defining Your Customer Journey in 5 Steps

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/unnamed-9.jpg" alt="unnamed-9"></figure>We always knew that Buoy Beer Co. brewed the best beer in Oregon, but now there’s an award to prove it.Thank you to the Portland Business Journal’s readers, who recently named Buoy the winner of the Oregon Beer Showdown 2016! Buoy has earned high ratings in the PBJ’s annual tournament-style face-off before, but 2016 marks their first time in the top spot.Considering the competition, it’s one hell of an honor. Our state is home to countless craft breweries, including some of the greatest and most innovative companies in the industry today.We’re proud of Buoy, and even more thrilled by the PBJ’s follow-up article, which features an interview with our friend Jessyka Dart-Mclean and enumerates 23 reasons why the brewery won this year’s showdown. The number one reason on the PBJ’s list? “[Buoy] has some of the best looking and cleanest labels in the beer world.”That look is by no means accidental. We worked closely with Buoy’s founders to design a brand that communicated the brewery’s Astoria roots, with a throwback quality and a modern finish. We wanted the labels to convey the rich history behind what Buoy does as well as the clarity of its founders’ vision. Buoy is a company with a strong point of view, but their beers are made for everyone. The challenge was creating a brand that would stand out and feel classic at the same time.Once again, we’d like to express our gratitude for everyone who voted for Buoy in this year’s Oregon Beer Showdown and for the PBJ for their fantastic coverage of Oregon’s craft breweries. Cheers!

Oregon Beer Showdown 2016: Congratulations, Buoy!

<a href="/assets/IMG_0375.jpg" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><img src="/assets/IMG_0375-1024x768.jpg" alt="img_0375" height="768" width="1024"></a>Meet Shane Wolfsmith, our new Director of Client Services. A creative industry veteran, Shane brings years of agency leadership and senior-level experience to Grady Britton. With stints at Leo Burnett, Saatchi &amp; Saatchi, as well as American Express, his past clients include major brands like P&amp;G, Charles Schwab, Google and HP, as well as more regional players like Blount, Silicon Valley Bank and Greater Portland Inc. No matter the size of the client, with Shane it’s all about rolling up your sleeves, aligning on a vision, collaborating, and doing great work together. But you can read about all that on <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/shanewolfsmith" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">his LinkedIn page</a>. We figured that to really get to know Shane, you should learn some facts about him you can’t find anywhere else. So, we presented him with ten questions—a few expected ones, and a few he certainly hasn’t been asked during an interview.GRADY BRITTON: What drew you to Grady Britton?SHANE WOLFSMITH: The people, the clients and the work. I’ve been in the agency world for some time and once I understood more about what GB did, who they were and who they worked with, as well as what they had hoped to accomplish in the world, I wanted to be part of it. What’s one thing you couldn’t live without?Rivers, mountains, forests. I guess that’s three.&nbsp;Describe your 80-year-old self. Where will you be? What will you be doing? I want to be one of those 80-year-olds who people can’t believe are still doing things. Like people are saying, “You won’t believe this old guy I know just completed the Pacific Coast Trail with his wife!” I also want to be telling stories to younger people—stories they want to hear, not ones they have to hear. Stories that inspire them to live the lives they want to live and to be true to themselves along the way. Who is your dream client?One who wants to do great work and have a true partner in doing so. What is your favorite type of food or dish?A spiedie. It’s a sandwich that’s native to where I grew up in Upstate New York. Marinated chicken or pork, cubed, grilled and served on a slice of fresh, Italian bread. And no condiments—it’s a rule that must not be broken.&nbsp;&nbsp;What is your favorite beverage?Non-alcoholic beverage is Evening in Missoula herbal tea from Montana Tea &amp; Spice Trading Co. I drink it almost every morning. Alcoholic is Clem’s Cream Ale from Migration Brewery. I don’t drink it most mornings.&nbsp;Where is your favorite place you’ve visited in the world?Incredibly hard question. I love so many places. Istanbul for my favorite city. South Africa for my favorite country. Sicily for my favorite island. New Zealand (South Island) being a very close second.Where/what is your dream vacation?Gosh, which one to choose! There are so many options. I’ve always wanted to spend several months in the world’s happiest country to see what can be learned. They are ranked each year if you can believe it or not. Denmark seems to sit at the top, but Finland, Iceland and Switzerland are up there too. I’d start in Iceland and see where things go!Dogs or cats?Dogs. I’m allergic to cats, but even if I wasn’t, it would still be dogs.&nbsp;What are your favorite sports teams?The Timbers, Denver Broncos, and CUBS! are where my loyalties lie. All of them have won national or world championships in the past 12 months, so it’s been an unforgettable sports year!If you want to learn more about Shane, feel free to send him an email at shanew@gradybritton.com!

Introducing Shane Wolfsmith, GB’s New Director of Client Services

Although they’ve existed since at least 1999, it took until 2015 for emoji to go mainstream. That was the year the Oxford Dictionaries selected ? (“face with tears of joy”) as “Word” of the Year. It was also the year that Apple broadened its emoji library with racially diverse icons of people, hand gestures, and faces.Also in 2015:<ul><li>Domino’s allowed customers to order pizza by tweeting emoji</li><li>Kim Kardashian launched her uber-popular Kimoji app, which grossed $1 million per minute at its peak</li><li>Chevrolet released a press release written entirely in emoji</li></ul>And emoji continue to dominate headlines these days, whether it’s the new set of 72 included in iOS 10, the UK judge who used a smiley face in an official ruling, or the restaurants adopting all-pictorial menus. Clearly, the world has become obsessed with tiny, (mostly) wordless iconography, and marketers have caught on. Emoji can create new connections between companies and consumers, and branded apps like Kimoji can become wildly lucrative on their own.But not everyone loves the current state of emoji. To many observers, brands’ attempts to stay #OnTrend with the #MillennialDemographic come off cringeworthy af ?. To help marketers avoid similar blunders, we’ve come up with a 7-point list of best practices for communicating with emoji:<h2>1. Get Familiar with the Facts ???</h2>?? Emoji originated in Japan roughly 17 years ago. Though superficially similar to emoticons—“:-)” for instance—emoji (sometimes pluralized as “emojis”) are discrete symbols rather than combinations of text, and are meant to connote not only feelings but a world of activities, places, food and drink, cultural markers, and so on. In fact, the word “emoji,” a compound formed from the Japanese e (絵, “picture”) and moji (文字, “character”) has nothing to do with the word “emotion.”? There are many different emoji “keyboards,” but there’s only one official set built into Unicode, a system that standardizes symbols across platforms and devices. In order to add a new Unicode Standard character, you have to submit a proposal to the Unicode Consortium, the nonprofit organization responsible for managing and approving emoji. Getting an idea through isn’t as impossible as it may sound—brands such as Taco Bell have successfully petitioned the Unicode Consortium to include new symbols, and grassroots campaigns have achieved similar results. You can find a list of updates and current emoji candidates at Emojipedia.<h2>2. Pay Attention to Meaning ????</h2>? Emoji can have lots of different implications aside from their obvious meaning. The eggplant emoji (?) is one infamous example, but there are dozens more commonly used to signify complex feelings and opinions. Many are innocuous: ? (“hot”/”fire”, meaning “amazing”), ? (playful embarrassment), ? (sometimes used to refer to a bug in software development), ?☕️ (“but that’s none of my business”). Search for the emoji you intend to use before you use them to avoid sending the wrong message to your audience.<h2>3. Don’t Overanalyze It ????</h2>?? It’s a woman crossing her arms, but what does it really mean? Much like explaining a joke, to overanalyze an emoji is to miss the point. Usually, the point is obvious—and if it isn’t, well, that’s probably the point. Don’t waste time and energy analyzing everything you see, and avoid giving your audience a message to “decode”; emoji are meant to enhance communication rather than obstruct it.?? Some emoji are totally ambiguous. And that’s okay. Sometimes, the best way to communicate how you feel is with an Easter Island head ?or a Space Invader ?. Or, to paraphrase Gertrude Stein, sometimes a whale playing a saxophone is a whale playing a saxophone is a whale playing a saxophone ??. Know when to let your emoji speak for themselves.<h2>4. Keep Technological Limitations in Mind???</h2>?? Complicating the sometimes-elusive meaning of emoji is the fact that although there’s only one standard set, the appearance of emoji varies by device and operating system. Google’s smiley faces, for example, are decidedly mushier than Apple’s. Compare it to the contrasts between typefaces: a phrase printed in Impact looks entirely different than a phrase printed in Comic Sans. Consider how the emoji you intend to use could differ by platform—something that looks like a grin could appear as a sneer to some viewers.? And then there are the times when emoji don’t show up. Once the Unicode Consortium approves a new emoji, developers have to code that emoji into their platforms and release an update. Some devices and operating systems take a longer time to update than others, and some older ones don’t support emoji at all. In either case, the emoji in question will display as an empty white box (□). If you’re marketing with emoji, be careful to test your message on various devices first. Know when to embed emoji directly into text and when to use images instead.<h2>5. Use Your Words ????????????????????⁉️</h2>?? Emoji are not replacing language. I repeat: emoji are not replacing language. A system of pictographs may seem like a modern version of hieroglyphics, or the beginning of a language like Mandarin Chinese, but the key distinction is that language has a widely agreed-upon meaning while emoji do not. And until they do, individual interpretations will continue to cause errors in communication.?????????????????? Plus, meaning varies across cultures. Even seemingly clear symbols like “person with folded hands” (?) can have multiple meanings: begging, prayer, or a high five.⁉️ All of which is why a PR stunt like Chevy’s all-emoji press release just doesn’t work. Emoji can’t carry the expressive weight of language on their own. The company may have meant, “It’s the best new thing since sliced bread for stylish and socially connected people,” but readers interpreted the eleven-character string as “Yes, new bread gets all dolled up to see a twin-Playboy bunny burlesque, text all the boys and girls from your phone.”<h2>6. Consider the Role of Your Brand ???®️??</h2>??? Think before you emoji. Are these colorful little symbols adding to your message or getting in its way? Does your use of emoji come from an authentic place, or is it bandwagon-hopping? Consider the shape and content of the emoji as well: What feeling are you attempting to get across? Do these pictorial representations of ideas match up with your brand and tone?®️ Decide what kind of emoji you want to use. The Unicode emoji palette is still somewhat limited: humans make millions of facial expressions, and there’s certainly more than one type of beer. But while a branded emoji keyboard gives you more control, it’s restricted by the people who choose to download it.? Pay attention to tone. Emoji are not a catch-all for everything cool, funny, and trendy. They can have an edge, and they can contain real, human information. Savvy marketers understand how to read emoji to understand how an audience is non-verbally responding to a message. For instance, Facebook’s expanded reaction options—which include “sad,” “angry,” “surprised,” and “laughing” emoji—provide a lot of data about how consumers feel when viewing an ad:Clicking ❤️ is easier than typing “I love this mattress.” But again, emoji are always open to interpretation. Does ? mean “this ad depresses me,” or “I wish I could afford this,” or something else entirely?? Stay ahead of the curve. Emoji are probably not a forever thing. They will likely&nbsp;fall out of style, as&nbsp;faster, even clearer, or more fun forms of communication emerge. Already, the addition of stickers has transformed Facebook, Snapchat, and iMessage, giving users more options to express themselves—and allowing brands to create their own new expressive tool sets.<h2>7. Dive In&nbsp;???????</h2>??????? Emoji are everywhere, and seemingly not done yet. And&nbsp;since it seems we haven’t yet&nbsp;hit peak emoji, enjoy&nbsp;them for what they bring to the everyday. They’re fueling creativity, promoting diversity, and helping people of all ages communicate better. So, whether you’re developing a branded Sticker Pack for the new iMessage, proposing a new icon to the Unicode Consortium, or simply spicing up your subject lines with some smiley faces, #thinkinpictures&nbsp;and remember to have a little fun. Woot.&nbsp;

Marketing meets Emoji: 7 Best Practices

Unboxing is awesome. And&nbsp;it’s become <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/shortcuts/2014/jul/21/unboxing-youtube-phenomenon-videos-unpackaging-toys">quite a thing</a>; a very real, very lucrative thing.&nbsp;Whether it’s the latest iPhone or that unforgettable birthday present from your childhood, the universal delight of opening a box is a feeling that never fades no matter how old or jaded we get. Hello, mystery. Unboxing. Even the word itself has a charming, crinkly crunch to it.&nbsp;One of the downsides of living in an increasingly digital world is that there are fewer and fewer opportunities to interact with good, old hand-crafted analog packaging. It’s especially true for those of us who work in advertising, branding, and PR. We all get (and send) dozens—if not hundreds—of marketing messages every day, but when was the last time you received a truly well-made piece of physical mail: something that made you pause, smile, and really engage in a campaign—something you actually held onto. Opening an email just can’t compare to opening a boxHere at&nbsp;Grady Britton, that line of thinking has been at the heart of a number of recent projects for our clients. It all started—as do many things worth doing—with plastic building blocks.<h2>Travel Portland</h2>You can read about it, look at pictures, and watch videos for months, but you can’t really understand the essence of a destination until you visit. Travel Portland wanted to give a select group of warm prospects the next best thing. The DMO tasked us to make our city stay top of mind for event planners, businesses, and convention organizers. We challenged ourselves to exceed our previous year’s work and further bridge the gap between being there and being here, Portland-style.The result: completely customized plastic building block sets representing the themes, landmarks, architecture, public transit system, and food that make Portland so&nbsp;Portland-y.We completely nerded out on all the details: figures’ t-shirts, sandwich boards, food cart license plates, and so on. The boxes and instruction manuals feature gobs&nbsp;of subtle design Easter eggs as well, which gave us the opportunity to draw recipients’ attention to specifics—like Portland’s 0% sales tax—in a fun, authentic way rather than through a dry fact sheet.But engineering these sets from the ground up also presented several serious logistical questions. Are there enough green cylinders in stock? Is this the right size for a desk? Is a 50-brick set too simplistic? Is a 200-brick set too complicated? We wanted the sets to have substance but not so much complexity that recipients would abandon construction midway through. And, with all this in mind, how do we ensure the cost per box stays below a certain parameter?Then there were quality control challenges. After receiving sample sets from our supplier, we assembled two at random and discovered they weren’t complete. Not the most fun day at the office, for a few reasons. (You ever step on one of these things?)Nonetheless, everything worked out fine in the end. Travel Portland was thrilled with&nbsp;the idea, recipients loved the execution, and we got better at, er, putting the pieces together to make an effort like this work… which was great, because we’d be doing another one again almost immediately.<h2>Bob’s Red Mill</h2>Sometimes the stars align, and work for one client inspires a creative campaign for another. As we were finalizing the building block sets for Travel Portland, Bob’s Red Mill called. The company wanted to introduce itself to buyers for large retail distributors in a&nbsp;remarkable new way.We started by considering what a day in the life of a retail food buyer is like, and the connection to boxes became obvious fairly quickly. When you’re in touch with so many food and beverage manufacturers, you’re inundated with free samples, stickers, keychains, mugs, and all sorts of doodads that usually end up tossed out or lost in some dark corner of an office or the trunk of your car. What could we do for Bob’s that would stand out?We conceived a ready-to-mail kit bursting with personality and rich in detail. In putting the box together, we focused on the recipient’s tactile experience: What should the box feel like? What are the ideal dimensions? What will be the first thing they see? The resulting package takes full advantage of its form, offering a classing unboxing experience. The goal was to create a box as appealing and substantial as what’s contained inside. We wanted it to look too pretty to throw away.We’re happy to report that Bob’s fell in love with<a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.gradybritton.com/work/bob-s-red-mill/scaling-a-beloved-brand-for-new-markets-and-diverse-audiences#product-launch-kits"> the presentation style </a>and form factor. One box led to another, and another. Although the basic canvas remains the same, each box is substantially different from the last, and each has found success with its audience. Matt Cox, Vice President of Marketing for Bob’s, tells us:“The pitch kits are big hits. The comments from our trading partners are flooding in, all of them going something like, ‘this is the best sample kit I have ever seen.’ We are getting fast acceptance of these new items and I think that quite a bit of the launches’ successes are due to your brilliant work.”Our latest box for Bob’s highlights the company’s Muesli line. We wanted the packaging to relate to the product’s roots, so we decided to thoroughly embrace Muesli’s Swiss–German heritage, Matterhorns and all. The box resembles an old leather suitcase covered in travel stickers. Each label refers back to a Muesli ingredient; for instance, Bob’s sources Australian blueberries, so we included an Australia sticker. The inside of the box is printed with a crossed spoons pattern and the contents are packed in European-feeling, rose-colored newsprint, which is printed with information about the product. Bob’s wanted to highlight its new packaging, so we devoted a section of the newspaper to resealability. Peppered with “Swenglish” phrases, the copy further underscores the Alpine quirk.<h2>Oregon Convention Center</h2>Meanwhile, our building block sets for Travel Portland caught the attention of the head of marketing at the Oregon Convention Center, who contacted us to do a similar project. The Convention Center wanted to reach a group of corporations and influencers in Portland who tend to hold large meetings. Rather than heading to the newest, hippest bar, why not book the Convention Center—the mothership of throwing big parties? After all, not only is it the largest venue in the Pacific Northwest, but its culinary staff have earned top distinctions from the Culinary Institute of America.To help the Oregon Convention Center assume (and frankly reestablish) its rightful place as a go-to venue for event planners, we pushed ourselves to create what would turn out to be our most ambitious box yet.Our designers created an artisanal jigsaw puzzle styled like a vintage poster, made out of wood and cut into large, chunky pieces. The completed image overlays the Convention Center on top of an illustration of Portland rendered like a cartoon from the 1940s or 50s. We encapsulated the theme in the phrase: “I love when it all comes together.”<ul><li>It’s a good thing we had some practice putting these boxes together before, because production turned out to be far more challenging than we expected. Our production partner hit a number of snags along the way, but ultimately they enjoyed learning what it takes to complete projects like this one. And we all developed a much greater respect for jigsaw makers.</li></ul><h2>Expo West</h2>There’s one final box I’d like to mention. We weren’t an exhibitor at this year’s Expo West, but as an agency focused&nbsp;on the natural and organic food and beverage industry, we wanted to leave an indelible impression on the contacts we came across.So, we put together—what else—a few little boxes. Enclosed in each one was a prepaid cell phone (the kind you can buy from a convenience store) programmed with our contact information. Think of it as a direct hotline—whenever you need marketing work, you can call us directly. Of course, a card was included as well, and the box itself was printed with more details about Grady Britton.Okay, one more: you can also see yet another box, which we made for Maker’s Day, at the top of this blog post.<h2>What We’ve Learned Along the Way</h2>What can you expect from a similar campaign? Here are some things we’ve learned from putting these boxes together over the past year:&nbsp;<ul><li>FOMO plays a big role in the success of a box. Though “make other people jealous” hasn’t been part of a creative brief, it’s a positive outcome: the box should create a ring of desire. You want people around the recipient you target—their colleagues, coworkers, and friends—to think, “I wish I had one of those too.” It’s basic word of mouth, in microcosm.</li><li>&nbsp;</li><li>Nostalgia plays a major role as well, and frequently informs the design. These boxes remind recipients of their childhood, and the act of unboxing tends to excavate a trove of memories related to gift giving and receiving.</li><li>&nbsp;</li><li>The three-dimensionality of a box provides so many opportunities to incorporate branding material and include fun messaging. As a result, we treat every box as an end product, working hard to make packaging that expresses everything great about the client and delights the recipient. We believe that if something is unique, detailed, and appropriate enough, it should stick around, have a shelf life, and be a rewarding experience unto itself.</li><li>&nbsp;</li><li>At their core, boxes may be a well-worn idea, but people regularly tell us what a fresh and exciting idea it is. Perhaps it’s because of the level of detail we try to infuse. And maybe it’s the cultural pendulum swinging backward, just a bit, from super-slick modern technology.</li><li>&nbsp;</li><li>Every box we’ve done has been both incredibly effective from a business standpoint and personally rewarding from a creative standpoint—although it’s getting harder to top ourselves every time!</li></ul>A&nbsp;final thought, since you’ve made it this far: I bet&nbsp;some of you have been expecting a certain something, a saying,&nbsp;to rear its ugly head at any time, but guess what? More than 1600 words about boxes and thinking&nbsp;and not one mention of that awful, lazy, clichéd-to-Hell-and-back metaphor. You know the one… Proof you can still be surprised by the thinking in the box.&nbsp;

These Boxes Won’t be Boxed In

Did you know that people in the Western United States take better care of their colons than the rest of the US population? Or that people search for more health procedures in the Summer? These may seem like strange facts for a marketing agency to know, but thanks to our client HealthSparq, we know more about things like vasectomies and labor and delivery than most.&nbsp;Our PR work with HealthSparq over the past two years has been creative and fun.The award-winning startup empowers people to make smarter decisions about their health care with a suite of tools that provides pricing and quality information about more than 400 common medical procedures. That means patients can comparison shop for hospitals and doctors before scheduling an appointment.Pretty ingenious, right? But as is the case for any technology startup, there’s always more to learn about your users to inform better products. Why not create a report out of those learnings that helps other health companies, and the broader healthcare industry, understand how people shop for health care?Creating the 2015 Shopping Trends ReportGrady Britton and HealthSparq went deep into the company’s user data to understand who out of the 74 million people across 70 US health plans (and counting) with access to their tools is shopping for health care,&nbsp;and what health procedures they shop for the most.We analyzed data from 237,000 people who had used HealthSparq to search for more than half a million cost estimates in 2015, and found some surprising results.The HealthSparq 2015 Health Care Shopping Trends Report is the culmination of that investigation into HealthSparq’s expansive customer data set. Here’s a sample of the stories, statistics, and insights the report brings to light:<ul><li>Most HealthSparq shoppers are ages 25–44, and women make up the majority (62%).</li><li>People in the Western US search for colon health two times more often than people elsewhere in the country.</li><li>The most active months for labor and delivery searches are July, August, and November—the same months in which the highest numbers of babies are born, according to the CDC.</li><li>Men search the most for birth control surgeries.</li></ul><h2>The Results</h2>We uncovered a few overall patterns that speak volumes about the modern health care consumer as well. We found out that people are shopping for both expensive major life events and everyday procedures, and that season and location significantly influence shopping habits.We also stumbled across some terrifying, hilarious, and outrageous search queries:(Warning: if you’re squeamish, skip the list below…)(Ready?)<ul><li>“tree fell on me”</li><li>“lightning strike”</li><li>“human bite”</li><li>“ring cut of finger”</li><li>“belly button removal”</li><li>“double vasectomy”</li><li>“hyena repair”</li><li>“outpatient predator”</li><li>“brain replacement”</li></ul>…and my personal favorite: “cat transplant.”We’re proud to say that the 2015 Health Care Shopping Trends Report not only provided a rare glimpse into the motivations shaping the US healthcare market, but generated substantial press for the company as well. In the first few months since the report has gone live, nearly 300 online publications have picked up the story. Additionally, HealthSparq reached over 1,300,000 Twitter accounts during a single #HITsm (short for “healthcare IT social media”) tweet chat.Check out the 2015 Health Care Shopping Trends Report for yourself! Visit shoppingtrends2015.healthsparq.com.&nbsp;

What Do US Health Consumers Care About Most? Check Out the HealthSparq 2015 Health Care Shopping Trends Report

PHOTO COURTESY OF STEVEN SMITH TEAMAKER TASTING ROOM&nbsp;Morning or night. Solo or socially. Tea is a timeless tradition, a drink available nearly everywhere, in virtually every culture. In fact, after water, tea is the most consumed beverage in the world.Yet as familiar as it is to billions of people, tea is often misunderstood and miscategorized. It seems “tea” can mean different things to different people. And even that is changing.Let’s start with the stereotypes: tea as the opposite of coffee. You drink one or the other, and neither side crosses over.Coffee drinkers: the Type A stress cases, neurotic go-getters and networkers, always on thanks to nonstop caffeination.Tea drinkers: introspective, a bit nerdy, always too calm; the ones blowing lightly on their mugs as they quietly watch their coffee drinking cohorts’ eyes spin in circles.While this perception may play (in all its oversimplified glory) here in the States, broaden your perspective, and a much more complex—and surprising—picture of caffeinated beverages (and their non-caffeinated cousins) starts to emerge. In countries like the UK and India, tea consumption is down while coffee consumption is at an all-time high. In China, a new generation of tea drinkers is displacing the old by valuing convenience over tradition.In the US, people are drinking tea at a rate unseen since before an infamous party in 1773. Which consumer group is behind the trend? You guessed it: millennials.In keeping with our demographic research into young consumers’ buying habits, there’s more than one reason for millennial tea mania. Brands would be wise to question their assumptions about some of the primary profiles of modern tea drinkers. For instance:<h2>1. The Health Worshipper</h2>Science suggested it, and media outlets amplified it: green tea boosts your metabolism and helps you lose weight. This positive association—similar to red wine’s supposed heart benefits—stubbornly persists not because it’s been proven, but because it hasn’t been disproven. Taken together with its long history, as well as its wealth of antioxidants and other healthful bioactive compounds, green tea’s status as a “healthy” beverage feels true.However tea—specifically beverages brewed from Camellia sinensis, the tea plant that also contains caffeine— boasts a plethora of proven benefits aside from weight loss. It may help prevent Alzheimer’s and improve cognitive function, not only in terms of mental acuity but also emotional well-being.Of course, caffeine provides plenty of perks and giddy feelings on its own, but even herbal teas (infusions that contain no trace of C. sinensis) are frequently thought to offer some kind of peace of mind or calming effect. There’s something relaxing about sipping hot, delicately flavored water.Tea is often considered as somewhat medicinal, whereas coffee seems to have more in common with cigarettes and alcohol—a “drug” rather than a “remedy.” Tea gets applied to colds, flus, headaches, and nausea and stomach problems. Coffee keeps you up, while tea helps you fall asleep.The Health Worshipper may not consume it on a daily basis, but keeps a few boxes of sachets in their pantry for when they’re feeling sick or overwhelmed. They may drink tea to support a diet, detox, or fasting regimen. They may look first to homeopathic medicine — which includes tea — before considering Advil, Tylenol, and Sudafed. They may extol the patient, ritualistic practice of brewing tea and waiting for it to cool, explaining that “tea forces you to slow down and savor the moment.”<h2>2. The Ex-Coffee Addict</h2>On the outside, the Ex-Coffee Addict resembles the Health Worshipper except for one key difference: they love coffee. Or rather, they used to, before it inspired digestive issues, panic attacks, and insomnia. Now, tea seems like a more attractive alternative.Certain teas and infusions can approximate the piquancy, mouthfeel, and psychoactive jolt of coffee. There’s earl grey, matcha, and yerba mate, for example. All three have escalated in popularity over the last decade in the US, right alongside growth in energy drinks and other functional beverage markets.Other consumers, meanwhile, are switching to tea because it contains less caffeine than coffee, or out of the belief that it contains none at all. They probably think they’re consuming less caffeine than they actually are, and may feel befuddled by the fact that “decaf” doesn’t mean “no caf” and bewildered by conflicting studies that praise or condemn caffeine—is it good for you or bad for you? How much is too much? This sense of confusion pervades the interpretation of labels such as “fair trade” and “single origin,” which may cause harried shoppers to abandon coffee entirely. They may have already wavered looking at that bag’s $14 price tag.Tea, by contrast, looks cleaner, simpler, and—crucially—less expensive. It has no affiliation to fast food or chains, whereas tens of millions Americans get their coffee fix from Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts, or McDonalds. Tea is also easier to make, and produces less waste than filters or certainly K-Cups. For maturing, eco-conscious consumers already primed toward the beverage for health and culture reasons, tea’s position as a cheaper alternative to coffee makes it an obvious choice.<h2>3. The Cultural Curator</h2>Ritual is also important for the Cultural Curator, but for distinctly different reasons. This type of tea consumer would be the first to tell you that tea is a global drink and that we live in a global society. They may understand their heritage partially through tea, or may want to connect more authentically to one of many tea traditions found throughout the world.Cultural Curators geek out over rare, hand-picked, and artisanally crafted teas, for which they’re willing to pay a premium. They may frequent tea bars and import loose leaf from specialty stores online. They know the right ways to brew, steep, and drink tea, as well as the proper name for herbal teas (tisanes), and the correct pronunciation of pu-erh—one of many shibboleths among connoisseurs. Or call them hipsters—take your pick.A Cultural Curator sees this purism justified by tea’s storied past and its threatened future. They regard tea as something tied to family, language, and a multitude of other cultural traditions and practices that often disappear through American assimilation.As Kristin Surak writes in “Making ‘Japanese’ Tea,” “Tea is sometimes seen as a way for second- and third-generations Japanese-Americans to learn how to be Japanese.” US immigrants from China, Tibet, Myanmar, India, Russia, Turkey, Egypt, Germany, the UK, Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil similarly look toward their country’s tea ceremony as a concrete way to appreciate and preserve an element of their cultural identity.Tea also has a social function, especially in the Muslim world, where the consumption of alcohol is considered haram. Nonetheless, that probably doesn’t stop the Cultural Curator from drinking tea cocktails—or even ayahuasca. Unlike the Heath Worshipper, the Cultural Curator has an academic, ethnographic interest in tea rather than a wellness-related one.<h2>4. The (Much) Bigger Question: Iced Tea Drinkers</h2>The bulk of this post has been about the hot, brew-it-yourself kind of tea. But surprise: brewed tea comprises just a sliver of the overall US market.About 85% of tea consumed in America is iced. Not everyone—and in fact, very few of us—actually make their own iced tea. The vast majority buy it premixed and stored in a refrigerator. The ready-to-drink category dominates the tea industry, and its features muddle lessons learned from other categories.For instance, some cans of iced tea contain as much sugar as an equivalent serving of soda. And sweet tea is a proud Southern—not Chinese, not Japanese, not British—tradition. Unlike all other genres of tea, this one was born in the US.Tea, something so seemingly simple, remains one vast, mysterious, complex force to be reckoned with—and thoroughly enjoyed in the process. And judging by its many new and lifetime loyalists, it’s only picking up steam.&nbsp;

Marketing and the 4 Types of American Tea Drinkers

“The greatest wealth is health.” – VirgilA report released last&nbsp;week in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) confirmed the trend that overall American’s diets are improving and we’re eating better healthier food. More fruits and vegetables, nuts, whole grains and fish.&nbsp;Less sugar, salt, processed foods and fat.Today, according to the Organic Trade Association organic products are available across America in more than 20,000 food stores and nearly 3 out of 4 grocery stores. And it is projected to grow at a compounded annual rate of 16 percent through 2020.&nbsp;Yay!!&nbsp;Right?!The JAMA report summarized in STAT, The Growing Diet Divide Between Rich and Poor, and discussed last week on NPR’s Here and Now, unfortunately also reveals that as the wealthiest become wealthier, they’re also becoming healthier due to a widening of diet inequality.SOURCE:&nbsp;ALEX HOGAN/STAT&nbsp;When Anna Vlastis, a fellow at STAT, was asked by NPR’s host what accounts for this difference, she replied that it’s not necessarily just related to how expensive healthier options might be for consumers. Findings revealed that healthy eating habits were mostly impacted by – TIME, KNOWLEDGE, ACCESSIBILITY AND… MARKETING.But just how much is advertising contributing to the widening gap at the dinner table between rich and poor Americans?And, as a growing movement of socially conscious natural and organic food companies and agencies who help them sell, what can we do to help fix the food system?The host falsely stated that we are “all exposed to the same kinds of ads on TV and PSAs.” If you’ve been following along with the Grady Britton blog, you know that that assumption is wrong – hypertargeting makes sure we don’t all see the same information.Hypertargeting is exactly what it sounds like: the process advertisers use to target very specific customers in crowded channels. Thanks to modern data, we can now efficiently and effectively micro-target people based on very specific lifestyle and behavior traits, ZIP codes, types of websites people visit, or types of products they buy, all of which may indicate a predisposition to buy our product or join our cause.But in this age, it raises the question for advertisers and marketers who care about not just selling things, but also doing good. Yes, our job is to market natural and organic products to audiences who fit the target consumer profile of that product. But what responsibility do we have to ensure that the messages about the healthfulness of products reach a broader audience would benefit in a different way? In other words, in selling natural and organic products, can we also educate and potentially improve health and quality of life of all people, not just a certain income bracket or lifestyle target.I certainly don’t have any answers, but I’m looking forward to Esca Bona in October, the event that New Hope Media is convening to discuss fixing the food system. At this event there will be food entrepreneurs, game-changing technologists and visionary business leaders from across the food supply chain in Austin for three days of discussion and collaboration on how to change the food inequalities and ensure good food for all.Hopefully how companies are spending their marketing budgets and targeting their advertising campaigns to do greater good will be a part of the discussion.Check out our hypertargeting blogs Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4.

Is Marketing Widening the Nutrition Gap?

Recently in Los Angeles, Whole Foods opened the first location of its new, millennial-centric supermarket chain. Dubbed 365 by Whole Foods Market, the store is named after Whole Foods’ in-house 365 Everyday Value brand, and aims to offer natural and organic products at low prices.Think of it as Whole Foods’ hipper, craftier, more frugal little sister. Just don’t forget about the main event; as some industry pundits have warned, 365 has the potential to cannibalize the Whole Foods’ sales, or at least prompt some questioning of the company’s established image and business model.For us, Silver Lake’s 365 store is newsworthy for two reasons:<ol><li>A second location will be opening in Lake Oswego, Oregon, in July.</li><li>The store’s layout and product offerings exemplify the creative and sometimes outlandish ways food and beverage marketers are trying to reach younger consumers.</li></ol>To learn what Whole Foods believes millennials value, and to get a glimpse—perhaps!—of what’s to come this July in Lake Oswego, take a look at some of 365’s unusual features:<h2>Affordable Avocados</h2>Is there any food with greater millennial appeal than the avocado? Not even kale can compare to the scoopable, spreadable, juiceable, nutrient-rich, good-kind-of-fatty wonder fruit. Millennials love it on their toast and in their burritos and bowls, and they buy significantly more of it than any other consumer group. According to Instagram, the 365 in LA offers bags of organic Hass avocados for $2.70—less than half of the price of the equivalent at Whole Foods.<h2>Produce and Prepared Foods, Front and Center</h2>As is the case at Main &amp; Vine, Kroger’s Seattle concept store, pre-packaged meals dominate 365, where take-out boxes are priced by size rather than weight. Suiting millennials’ appetites for all things authentic, local, and fashionable, the store’s food bars showcase “trending flavors and ethnic tastes.” Vast and lush, the produce display forms the store’s nucleus, perhaps because—you guessed it—young shoppers can’t get enough fresh fruits and veggies.<h2>Lots of Vegan Stuff</h2>Although most millennials don’t adhere to strict plant-based diets, the largest group of vegans (42%) comprises people between the ages of 18 and 35. In general, and for social and environmental reasons, younger consumers who do eat animal products are more inclined to cut back on meat and try dairy alternatives. Consequently, 365 stocks a wealth of vegan options not available anywhere else: baked goods, Kite Hill yogurt and cream cheese, exclusive dishes created in partnership with by CHLOE, and even cupcakes for your dog.<h2>Robots!</h2>&nbsp;One of the more outlandish and buzzed-about aspects of the 365 store in LA is the teaBOT: a mechanical kiosk that will brew a customized blend of loose-leaf tea for you in less than a minute. Elsewhere in the store, you’ll find digital scales, automated self-checkout machines, and wine scanning stations provided by Delectable—an app that crowdsources reviews and information about vintages all over the world.The forthcoming 365 store in Lake Oswego won’t be an exact replica of the one in Silver Lake. We know, for instance, that our local 365 will host new locations of Next Level Burger and Canteen. Whole Foods has also hinted at the possibility of a tattoo parlor and a record store, though these ideas are likely illustrations of the Friends of 365 concept rather than actual partnerships. But hey, with vegan dog cupcakes and tea-brewing robots in LA, you never know.We’ll follow up with more when Oregon welcomes its 365 store next month—watch this space in July.

What to Expect at the First Oregon Whole Foods’ 365 Store

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/marvbox4-924x1024.jpg" alt="Examples of the Pizza Hut boxes, a brand partnership for Marvel's new movie"></figure>Its characters may be fighting onscreen, but Captain America: Civil War is a product of collaboration. In the days leading up to the release of the film, Marvel revealed that they had spent $200 million on promotional tie-ins (which, let’s be honest, isn’t unheard of these days—check out our roundup of Anchorman 2’s ridiculous-in-the-best-way publicity). From Harley-Davidson to Pizza Hut, over 100 companies worldwide participated in the Civil War marketing blitz, making it one of the biggest co-branding campaigns in recent memory.Between the Marvel Universe and Star Wars, Disney owns two of the most bankable properties in media and entertainment, and the conglomerate isn’t afraid to spend the equivalent of Palau’s annual GDP on merchandising.But you don’t need millions of dollars, multiple theme parks, and controlling interest in Robert Downey Jr’s soul to successfully launch a co-branding effort. Small and medium-sized brands can—and should—collaborate to bring cool ideas to life and deepen their engagement with fans and consumers.No matter your size, timeline, intention, or number of partners, it takes three ingredients to make a co-branding campaign work:<h2>Exclusive Benefits</h2>The Portland Trail Blazers may not have the largest stadium or fan base in the NBA, but that hasn’t stopped the team from innovating through collaborations with regional companies and startups. The Blazers have tapped into Oregon’s thriving tech community to enrich fans’ experiences before, during, and after the game. With invisible barcodes and peer-to-peer parking, the team can give its supporters the benefits of cutting-edge technology while providing the emerging companies behind that technology with exposure to a wider audience.<h2>Purpose, Purpose, Purpose</h2>Remember the Ben &amp; Jerry’s/New Belgium collaboration we blogged about back in January? The reason that campaign caught our attention was because it beautifully demonstrated the necessity of purposeful teamwork. Now, that may sound simple, but let’s break it down—I’m not just referring to “purpose” in one sense:<ol><li>As B Corps, the two companies share a larger, overall purpose: positive social and environmental impact.</li><li>&nbsp;</li><li>By touting the companies’ shared values and building buzz around B Corps, the strategy had a marketing purpose—it was the right way to promote the mission.</li><li>&nbsp;</li><li>Because Ben &amp; Jerry’s and New Belgium appeal to many of the same consumers, and each company’s flavors translate well to the other’s products, the partnership simply made sense—it was a purposeful collaboration, rather than an arbitrary one.</li></ol>Target’s partnership with UNICEF is another great recent example of this principle in action. Last October, around the same time of year when kids in the U.S. traditionally go door-to-door to collect UNICEF donations, the charity and the retailer teamed up to develop the Kid Power Band: a fitness wearable that interfaces with a proprietary app. Kids can accomplish “missions” to earn points and “unlock” food for underserved, malnourished communities around the world. As a co-branding campaign, it works by harnessing existing consumer behavior and awareness and repackaging it into a gamified form at once familiar and fun.<h2>Strategic and Demographic Utility</h2>While not a co-branding campaign by strict definition, Michelin Guides exemplify the long-term rewards a company gains through experimentation and collaboration outside of that company’s primary industry.Published in 1900, the first Michelin Guide was a free publication meant to sell cars. It listed hotels and gas stations, and included maps and vehicle repair instructions. Over the years, as the publication grew in circulation, it expanded into different territories and began to encompass a greater scope of information for tourists. The guides soon catalogued restaurants, and eventually, awarded those restaurants with stars. As dining establishments competed for more stars, Michelin Guides rose in prominence. Thus, what started as promotional giveaway material for a tire company evolved into one of the most influential critical references on food.Why? Because, as it turns out, everyone needed Michelin Guides. Michelin needed a tactic that would reliably build a customer base. Drivers (there were fewer than 3,000 in France at the time) needed information about what was out there on the road. Restaurants needed endorsement from an independent authority that would set them apart. And these days, destination marketing organizations, many of which have partnered with Michelin to create city- or country-specific guides, rely on Michelin’s name brand recognition to drive tourism rates.In each of the examples above, brands were able to branch out into new product areas and initiatives by working together. But the results didn’t happen at random: co-branding needs to be useful—and it needs to make sense—for all involved.Beyond that, the possibilities are endless. I hope you’re motivated to try something new!

How Brand Partnerships Can Empower Your Company’s Marketing

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/megaphone-tall.jpg" alt="megaphone-tall"></figure>Kate Middleton is a millennial. Born on January 9th, 1982, Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge is one of the oldest among her generation (at least according to the age range established by original millennial demographers William Strauss and Neil Howe) but she still counts as a member of Generation Y. If you go by the Pew Research Center’s definition, you would have to consider Justin Timberlake and Beyoncé millennials as well.The youngest celebrity millennials? Maisie Williams, and possibly even Willow and Jaden Smith.Yes, it’s hard to imagine, but Arya Stark and Queen Bey—not to mention a future queen of England—are all part of the same demographic age group, as agreed upon by most economists, historians, and researchers. And they’re joined by about 75–80 million others, constituting the largest generation in world history.So why do we often talk about millennials as though they’re one homogeneous heap of consumers? Depending on who you ask—or which just-released survey you read—millennials are entitled or indebted, lazy or hard-working, selfish or socialist. In lieu of being able to proclaim any substantive, universal truth about such a vast, diverse group of people, commentators of all kinds instead use the term “millennial” to basically shout, “bah, young people!” or “yay, young people!”The reality is that, technically, many millennials are aging out of one stage of life and into parenthood, full-time careers, and home ownership—characteristics that marketers are relatively familiar with.We think the actual question that brands face is “How to engage with an audience that’s younger than us, and has grown up in an entirely different culture?” Rather than label them “millennials,” let’s look at what consumers age 18-24 really care about. What can college-aged adults tell us about our preconceptions about the next young generation as a whole?<h2>What Consumers Ages 18–25 Value</h2><h3>Discovery and Self-Expression Through Social Media</h3>College-aged consumers are less cynical about social media and more reliant on their social networks than older millennials:<ul><li>“84% of consumers 18-24 say online shopping behaviors are influenced by social media.” [Source: PwC]</li><li>“Younger people are … more likely to follow brands because they are interested in buying their products: 43% of 18-24 year olds said they do that, compared to 29% of 35-44 year olds and 27% of 45-54 year olds.” [Source: MarketingSherpa]</li><li>“Half of the U.S. Millennials ages 18-24 and 38% of those ages 25-34 agreed that brands ‘say something about who I am, my values and where I fit in.’” [Source: Boston Consulting Group]</li><li>“Nearly half (44.3%) of young Millennials age 18-24 and 33.8 percent of older Millennials age 25-34 indicate they discover new art through social media channels, compared to the largest percentage of Baby Boomers age 65+ (29.5%) who prefer a more traditional discovery path by finding new art through museums.” [Source: Invaluable]</li></ul><h3>Mobile and Virtual Technology</h3>The youngest segments of adult consumers show the highest willingness to adopt and cherish mobile and virtual technology:<ul><li>“In the 18-24 age group, 65% buy using their smartphones, while 63% of all shoppers age 25-34 and 58% of all 35-44-year-olds buy using those devices.” [Source: Bronto Software]</li><li>“96% of millennials aged 18-24 view their mobile phones as the most important part of their daily lives.” [Source: Retail Touchpoints]</li><li>“Younger millennials (ages 18-24) are most likely to sleep with their smartphone on the bed (34%).” [Source: Bank of America]</li><li>Out of all ages polled, viewers between 18–24 were the age group with the highest awareness of esports. [Source: PwC]</li><li>“Younger consumers are the most likely to have tested virtual reality, with 18 percent of 18-24 year olds reporting that they have already tried VR and 46 percent eager to try it.” [Source: YouVisit]</li></ul><h3>Adventure and Experience with as Little Risk as Possible</h3>Younger consumers are more willing to take a chance on unfamiliar products and experiences than their older counterparts, but are careful to make smart purchasing decisions and avoid putting themselves or their finances in jeopardy:<ul><li>“[Y]oung Gen Yers are more adventurous than older generations in their food choices, with 47 percent of younger versus 40 percent of older Millennials claiming to choose something new (compared to only 34 percent or less for older generations).” [Source: The NPD Group and CivicScience]</li><li>“Nearly half (49%) of consumers 18-24 years old say brand stories are most likely to get them interested in a travel brand.” [Source: Headstream]</li><li>“[B]arely half of today’s college students ages 18 to 24 have a credit card, compared with nearly nine in 10 who say they use a debit card.” [Source: Sallie Mae]</li></ul><h3>What Young People Value</h3>So what values do young consumers have in common?Authenticity: Millennials and the generation behind them consistently show a preference for brands, choices, and marketing strategies they perceive as “authentic.” Millennials are much more likely to trust experts and influencers over advertisements, and rank authenticity higher than actual content when consuming news. Four-quarters of millennials prefer to spend money on experiences rather than things, and more than half plan to increase their experience spending.Giving back: These young demographics&nbsp;are a highly philanthropic generation, and are heavily invested in social and environmental change. More than 80% have donated money, food, goods, or services to a cause they care about. Six out of ten believe businesses should make it easier for consumers to get involved in the issues, while eight in ten expect a business to be commit to positive social and environmental change. A substantial number have said they would pay more for a product or service if doing so helped a cause they believed in.We’ve witnessed this behavior firsthand in our work with the Willamette Week Give!Guide. Year after year, as young consumers have grown in purchasing power, we’ve watched Give!Guide donations steadily increase, and donors under 35 comprise a large segment of the annual audience.Health: Millennials value their health and well-being, or at the very least like to appear as though they do. They own more connected health devices, exercise more, and spend more on athletic wear than their parents and grandparents. They are also more willing to pay a premium for foods they consider healthy. As a result, the organic and natural food and beverage market has exploded over the last few years, and chains from Kroger to Whole Foods are altering their approaches to better target millennials.We’ll continue to address this topic on our blog. Until next time, if you’re eager for further millennial myth-busting, you might be interested in attending the 2016 Gallup Summit next week.&nbsp;Here are a few more links on the topic, in case you want to dig in further.&nbsp;1. Meaghan Moraes (2015).&nbsp;8 Modern Tips for Marketing to Millennials&nbsp;HubSpot&nbsp;2. Elite Daily (2015).&nbsp;Millennial Consumer Trends Amazon News&nbsp;3. Eventbrite.&nbsp;Millennials – Fueling the Experience Economy Amazon News&nbsp;4. Walden University (2011).&nbsp;Social Change Impact Report Walden&nbsp;University&nbsp;5. Larissa Faw ( 2014).&nbsp;Millennials Expect More Than Good Products, Services to Win Their Loyalty Forbes&nbsp;6. Millennial Marketing (2016). Who Are Millennials Millennial Marketing&nbsp;7. Staff Writer (2016).&nbsp;Parks Associates HIT Consultant&nbsp;8. BrightMark (2015).&nbsp;Why Millennials are Fitness Fanatics: The Social Nature BrightMark Consulting&nbsp;9. Trefis Team (2016).&nbsp;For Athletic Wear Vendors, How Athleisure Can Continue to Grow By Remaining “Trendy” Forbes&nbsp;10. Nielsen (2015).&nbsp;Younger Consumers Endorse Healthy Foods with a Willingness to Pay The Nielsen Company&nbsp;

What Are We Really Saying When We Talk About Millennials in 2016

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/Tonys-Chocoloney-bars-3.png" alt="Tonys-Chocoloney-bars"></figure>Last fall, the Daily Beast published an article about the lawsuit recently filed against Nestle, Mars, and Hershey, which alleges that these companies are guilty of false advertising for not disclosing their chocolate was likely made using slave labor. The story quotes Shady Chocolate director Miki Mistrati, who said:[T]he lawsuit may help, but it won’t be the answer. There is no doubt that a campaign about the reality in chocolate production will harm the chocolate companies. Modern slavery with children is a part of the chocolate industry today. But I do not think that it can be the real game changer.In the absence of effective legal measures to end child slavery, Tony’s Chocolonely is making a serious bid to become that game changer. Based in the Netherlands, the company has been working for ten years to make the chocolate industry 100% slave-free. And just recently, Tony’s launched an ambitious international expansion effort.Peter Zandee, the company’s U.S. sales manager, is leading the charge—starting here, in Portland. We decided talk to welcome Peter to the neighborhood, and our chat quickly evolved into a long-form interview, which we thought we could share with the readers of our blog.If you missed the first half of our conversation, click here to read Part 1.This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.MORGAN RIDER: We talked previously about fair trade. Aside from that, there are millions of labels, from gluten-free to GMO, natural, organic… What’s your sense of what these mean to consumers, and how seriously do you take labeling as a company?PETER ZANDEE: We call that “label bingo.” People understand less and less of what these labels mean. To us, fair trade is the most important certification, but we feel that every company should take their own responsibility to work on what’s happening in their supply chain and not hide behind labels.We’re all about impact. Over the last couple of years there have been lots of initiatives but there’s not necessarily a lot of impact. And the situation is getting worse. The larger cocoa companies have set up initiatives, but if the situation is getting worse, then something is broken. You can be proud of the fact that you’re “doing something,” but if there’s no outcome at the end of the day, then what’s the use?At GB, we see our role as trying to help catalyze a greater movement in the market among consumers to care more about the companies they buy from. In your mind, what does it take for a standard like B Corp, organic, or slave-free to catch fire in the hearts of consumers?I am not confident that a standard or label really can. With so many labels and certifications it has become too confusing. Maybe more so than labels consumers are looking for companies that they trust. Patagonia is a great example.What about the slave-free label speaks to people?We are not proposing another label. We show that it can be done differently, by creating a transparent system and working directly with the farmers. This is the right thing to do for everybody. It’s certainly the right thing to do, as far as I’m concerned, from an ethical perspective.&nbsp;Let’s talk about transparency and consumer education. How do you think consumer attitudes have shifted in terms of where products come from, and how those products are made? What tactics have you used to successfully educate and motivate consumers to make better choices?We don’t do any paid advertising. We have our chocolate bars—when they’re on store shelves, they look so different from anything else. People pick them up, and they love the packaging. There’s information on the bar, and when you open the bar they just look completely different from any other chocolate bar because they’re unequally divided. We’ve done that to sort of showcase that things are not shared fairly in the chocolate industry.We do lots of talks and demonstrations. Right now, in Portland, we’re in the store a lot. We do what we call “Tony Talks,” where we go to companies or organizations or schools and basically talk about what we’re trying to do. In that way, we create more awareness.And in Holland, we have a pretty large social media following, but it all basically happened organically. People get excited about it. It’s just amazing to see the response that you get.Bob’s Red Mill is a client of ours, and Bob’s has been in Portland for forty or more years now too. They had nationwide and global distribution, but nobody outside the northwest knew Bob, or why you should grab his flour versus King Arthur versus General Mills. That was one of the things we have to do with our marketing: tell the story about Bob—what he does, he loves, and the company. What are some of the issues you face in simply getting the brand out there and selling chocolate?&nbsp;We’re growing much faster than anybody else, and that puts commercial pressure on us. Sometimes it complicates our ability to sell the chocolates. But because of our mission, story, and our brand, it’s still easy to stop people in their tracks and get them to listen to you.In Holland, there’s clearly this duality in our brand between the seriousness of the issue and what we are trying to accomplish, and then the “fun factor.” We always have to be careful not to go too far in one direction or the other. If we get overly serious, then it becomes too depressing. If we get too fun, then we end up losing the the fact that we are here to really change the industry.&nbsp;What do your expansion plans in the U.S. look like now?We’re looking at the Seattle market. Maybe we’ll go to San Francisco and Denver—maybe a couple of months from now. We want to try to keep it somewhat controlled, although it’s really difficult because it’s the genie’s out of the bottle, and we’ve gotten calls from everywhere. People now want to sell our chocolates.A lot of small natural and organic foods companies start out with a great product and a great mission. They get large enough and gain enough traction to make the larger companies acquire them. So often these large companies don’t have the trust, mission and brand core, so it can come across to consumers like the big guys are trying to “buy” the authenticity by acquiring smaller brands.Yes. There’s no interest in selling Tony’s at the moment. There’s still so much opportunity to further our cause. But in the future, who knows? If, all of a sudden, it could really propel our cause, then that might be a possibility. For us, the goal is a 100% slave-free chocolate industry. Right now, though, this is not something we’re thinking of.What we want to do is make great chocolates. Like we say, we’re crazy about chocolate and serious about people. We want to make amazing-tasting chocolate for an affordable price without using illegal child labor. That’s what we’re out to prove: a great chocolate, at a very affordable price, produced without the use of child labor.&nbsp;

Making the World a Better Place with Chocolate: An Interview with Peter Zandee of Tony’s Chocolonely (Part 2)

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/Tonys-Chocoloney-bars.png" alt="Tony's Chocolonely is a fair trade slave-free chocolate company."></figure>If, like many of our blog readers, you a) live in Portland, and b) love chocolate, you may have noticed a new brand on the shelves. Rocking bright, technicolor wrappers, and adorned with the chunkiest 70s-throwback font imaginable, Tony’s Chocolonely makes a bold statement. But it’s not just a matter of appearances—the Netherlands-based company is singularly dedicated to transforming its industry by putting an end to the abominable practice of child slavery, which accounts for so much of the low-priced chocolate found in stores around the world.How is the company achieving its mission while scaling with authenticity? And what can other members of the food and beverage industry with an eye towards change learn by example?To get a sense of the answers, I sat down with Peter Zandee. Peter is Tony’s Chocolonely’s U.S. sales manager, and has been playing a leading role in expanding the company’s presence here in the States.We spoke about the company’s unique beginnings, its plans for expansion, and its ambitious mission. And, because Tony’s Chocolonely and Grady Britton are both B Corps, we also talked about corporate responsibility movements in broad terms: what it takes to get a movement off the ground, how they impact consumer behaviors, and Peter’s thoughts on the future of various trends and labeling campaigns.This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.MORGAN RIDER: Tony’s Chocolonely has been around for over 10 years in the Netherlands, but just recently established its U.S. headquarters here in Portland. Can you give us some background on the Tony’s history—what you do and why you do it?&nbsp;PETER ZANDEE: We were started ten years ago. There is a food TV show in the Netherlands called “Keuringsdienst van Waarde”—in the U.K. it’s called “Food Unwrapped.” They look into food products and into issues in the supply chain of these products. A little over ten years ago, they started looking into the slavery issues in the cocoa industry in West Africa, and found that the chocolate companies weren’t doing much, even though they had committed to do so by a senate protocol that they had signed in 2001.So child slavery was an open secret.Yeah. The issues with slavery in the cocoa industry were well known. In 2001, Senators Harkin and Engel created a protocol to eradicate child slavery in the cocoa industry in West Africa. All the large chocolate companies signed the protocol. And so in 2005, this Dutch TV show started digging and found that too little was really being done—Despite the protocol.Yeah, obviously, none of these companies wanted to make any statements on TV. Then, after consulting with some legal experts the journalist decided to eat chocolate and turn himself into the police—because, in Holland, if you buy a stolen bicycle, you’re an accomplice to the crime if you buy it knowing that it was stolen. Eventually the judge did not convict him because he didn’t want to convict every single Dutch chocolate consumer, and [the judge] couldn’t prove a direct link between the bars that he had eaten and the child slaves that came in to testify.This lack of traceability is a critical issue in the industry. There are millions of farmers, but only a handful of global companies that process the cocoa. And there’s no traceability, really, in that supply chain. They never really knew where an issue on a farm would be: how the beans are harvested, or where that chocolate would end up—like, which brands?After [this journalist] wasn’t convicted, Teun (aka Tony) decided to make 5,000 chocolate bars just to show that he could make slave-free chocolate. 15,000 people in Holland signed up online the first day to buy the chocolate bars. After that they decided to make a company of it.Since then, our mission has been to create a 100% slave-free chocolate industry, not just our chocolate but all chocolate worldwide.What exactly is, from a consumer perspective, fair trade versus slave-free?Fair trade is a great first step, but it doesn’t guarantee slave-free. Fair trade technically doesn’t allow slavery either, but there isn’t sufficient enforcement of the fair trade rules. Unfortunately, we can’t necessarily guarantee 100% slave-free. For example, a couple of years ago, we found some issues on one of our farms. But, in our case, we try to be much more present locally and address issues when they come up. Our focus is on the eradication of child slavery.So what percentage of fair trade chocolate now do you think is still being produced using slavery?It’s impossible to say, because when you’re buy fair trade chocolate it’s not necessarily fair trade beans that are in that chocolate. Just like when you buy wind energy from the energy company, you’re not really buying–…A light powered by a turbine?Yeah. So for cocoa, it’s the same. All the cocoa beans basically go to just a couple big cocoa traders and producers. They buy a certain percentage of their beans fair trade and they sell a certain percentage of their beans fair trade. But the beans sold are not necessarily truly fair trade beans. In our case they are, because we have that traceability in our process. We know who our farmers are. Over 60% of the world’s cocoa comes from West Africa—from Ghana and the Ivory Coast—and there are almost two million children working there under illegal circumstances.That’s awful.And the situation is only getting worse according to some of our latest reports—one in particular by Tulane University.What is the tenure? Do the kids escape? How long do they stay working in the fields?That’s a good question. I don’t know. Sometimes these kids can be as young as maybe seven or eight years old, and it goes up to eighteen or so—that’s when they’re considered to be no longer children. When we talk about child slavery, it’s not just the people that are trafficked and bought and sold and kept. The official definition of modern slavery, when it applies to the cocoa industry—and this comes from the U.N. as well as the local governmental level—is children who are not allowed to go to school or, who do work under dangerous circumstances. Also the children who are trafficked are part of that, but it’s a much bigger group than children that are truly trafficked.There are a lot of families whose children work on their farm, and that’s okay by us as long as they go to school and don’t do dangerous work. When they’re not allowed to go to school and do dangerous work, it becomes an issue.You’re working now with farmers around West Africa.We work directly with the farmers. In a sense we are a bean to bar company. We know who the farmers are, we go there, we work with local organizations that are at the co-ops regularly.Do you think those farms perform better, have better employees, or better quality of life? Is there incentive for other farmers?Well, we start by paying 25% more than what the price is on the world market, and that’s already considerably higher than the fair trade premium. So that helps. We do a lot of education, not only around child slavery, but trying to help them become more productive farmers. Both elements are necessary to really lift them out of poverty. We’ve done research on what we think is a living wage, and we think we should increase our premiums even a little more than where we are at right now, but we do also calculate into that equation the fact that the farmers need to become somewhat more productive. So that’s also what we are helping with.According to your annual FAIR report, setting an example as a business is an important measure of your success. What does it take to inspire other chocolate companies to commit to slave-free chocolate?When we started in Holland, there were basically no fair trade chocolates. Now, pretty much everybody there is fair trade. We have a three-stage road map: The first stage is creating awareness around the issues in West Africa. The second stage is “lead by example,” which you can read about in our annual report. Leading by example basically means that we’ve worked to set up a process of sourcing that we think would eradicate child slavery if everybody were to follow that.So it could be replicated on a massive scale?Yes. That has always been very important to us. Instead of working directly with farmers on a smaller scale, what we have done is that we’ve worked with one of the largest chocolate processors in the world and created traceability in our entire supply chain. And because we do it with one of the largest cocoa processors in the world, we know that this can be replicated, that Mars, or Hershey’s, or Mondelez, or Nestle can do it too. It’s always been important for us to show that we can be socially responsible and commercially successful, and that our process is scalable so other companies can do it too.The third stage is “inspire to act.” That’s where we are now, especially in Holland, where we are trying to motivate other companies to follow our lead and work together with them on some of these items. They’re slowly starting to pop up: some other initiatives that basically are taking the lead from our book.It must be difficult to scale and still keep traceability and control.It’s important to grow but we don’t want to go too fast necessarily because at the end of the day we need to tell the story. That’s why we initially focused on Portland and tried not to go to too many geographic areas right away. Now we are looking to expand, but we’ll never grow big enough to solve the problems by ourselves. At some point, hopefully, other companies will follow. I don’t know where the tipping point will be, but it’s amazing to see how everybody we work with is excited about it.I think what you guys do well is you do provide that hope and you can show that there is an alternative way, and it’s a good way.Yes, it is hopeful, the fact that we do offer a model that we really think that could solve the slavery issue to a large extent, and that’s gainable, and that companies like Mars and Hershey’s could deduct. I’m hoping that makes it also easier for politicians or the legal system to say, “Hey, you know what? It is possible.” So you really don’t have an excuse not to go down that path.—Stay tuned to our blog for the second and final part of this interview, wherein Peter and I discuss topics such as consumer education and “label bingo,” coming soon!

Scaling With Authenticity: An Interview with Peter Zandee of Tony’s Chocolonely (Part 1)

Marathon Scholars, The Dougy Center, Meals on Wheels People, S.M.A.R.T.—united by region, local nonprofit organizations like these share a passion for finding innovative ways to help out the members of our community who need it most.We want to give back to these and other nonprofits for all they do to help our community. Each year, the Grady Britton Grant provides one Portland-area nonprofit with a $25,000 donation of in-kind marketing services. The recipient meets with us to decide how to use their new funds: on advertising, brand development, public relations, digital strategy, or any number of our team’s capabilities.We’re happy to announce that applications for the 2016 GB Grant are now open! Last year, our two grant winners, Marathon Scholars and LIVE, both had amazing successes, and we are so proud of the work we did in partnership with them.We also had another amazingly successful year with our other major philanthropic initiative, the Willamette Week's Give?Guide, earning $3.6 million for local nonprofits.Read on to learn about some of the work we’ve done for our grant recipients in past years, and how you can apply.<h2>What Can This Year’s Grant Winner Expect?</h2><h3>Marathon Scholars: Listen In</h3>Marathon Scholars, last year’s GB Grant winner, is an education program that pairs low-income students with adult mentors for four years or more. The name refers to the “marathon”—financial, emotional, and otherwise—young people hurtle through on the path toward completing a college degree. Inspired by the StoryCorps model, we collaborated with Marathon Scholars to launch Listen In: an audible collection of students’ and mentors’ stories.<h3>Meals on Wheels People</h3>Whether they’re in need of a hot meal or just craving the company, thousands of Portland seniors depend on Meals on Wheels People. In 2013, we worked alongside the organization to create a broadcast sponsorship campaign that would boost awareness during the holiday fundraising season. The results? An astounding 800% increase in website visits, and more than 5 million TV and social media impressions. Perhaps most incredible is that, through donations, Meals on Wheels People doubled its initial marketing budget investment.<h3>S.M.A.R.T.: Readers Change History</h3>S.M.A.R.T. (Start Making a Reader Today) was our first GB Grant winner, and the campaign we created together in 2008 remains one of our favorites. Today, S.M.A.R.T. is Oregon’s largest literacy nonprofit; but back when we first met, the organization was facing difficulties in recruiting volunteer readers for its program. We developed an identity and media package under one powerful tagline: “Readers Change History.”<h2>Apply for the 2016 GB Grant</h2>These are only a few examples of how GB Grant recipients have spent their in-kind donation. How would your organization use marketing and creative services worth $25,000?If you or someone you know is involved in a local nonprofit, we encourage you to apply and—hopefully—find out. For more information about the GB grant, as well as additional case studies featuring past winners.

Announcing the 2016 GB Grant

If you had $3.5 million to donate, what cause would you support? Animals? The environment? Education? Culture? Your community?How about all of the above? Over the holidays, that’s exactly what Portland did, give or take a couple thousand dollars. This year’s Willamette Week Give!Guide campaign was the biggest yet, and here are a few quick stats to prove it:&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/blogpost-GG-results-2.png"></figure>Yes, the scope and impact of WW’s annual fundraising effort have grown immensely since its inception in 2004. Back then, the Give!Guide raised $22,000 overall; these days, contributors match that amount in the space of ten minutes.<h2>What Is The Willamette Week Give!Guide?</h2>WW created the Give!Guide to provide its readers with a simple, surefire path to give back to local nonprofit organizations. Each year, the Guide gathers together over a hundred nonprofit participants whose missions fall into eight categories: Animals, Arts, Community, Education, Environment, Health &amp; Wellness, Social Action, and Youth.The Give!Guide differs from conventional year-end fundraising campaigns in a few key ways. First, it’s one of the only city-wide philanthropy initiatives we know of spearheaded by a weekly alternative newspaper. Second, G!G highlights the contributions of readers ages 35 and younger, in an ongoing effort to encourage more young people to make giving back a habit early in life. The newspaper also awards the Skidmore Prize to four local nonprofit leaders every year.<h2>GB’s Role</h2><figure class="image"><img src="/assets/gg-lockup-1024x575.png" alt="gg-lockup"></figure>Grady Britton got involved with the Give!Guide a couple years ago when we acquired OakTree Digital. We rebuilt giveguide.org to provide some new functionality and a new look and feel. Because so many people donate using their phones—some sources claim more than half of nonprofit website visitors are using a mobile device—we knew we needed to make the site mobile-friendly. We also wanted to optimize it to reach an even larger portion of that younger audience.Last year, we improved the site further, adding a bunch of security and transaction upgrades, such as reducing the possibility of accidental duplicate donations and allowing visitors to tell the site not to store their information. User experience-wise, we continued to streamline and spiff things up. It can be a challenge to feature all that data on one page—giving statistics, nonprofits and their categories, information about incentives, the Skidmore Prize winners, the list of sponsors, and frequently asked questions—but we think the site is sleeker, faster, and more usable than ever.<h2>2015 G!G Results</h2>But enough about us. Take a look at the outstanding results our city achieved last month:<ul><li>Total donations: $3,501,400 (up 10% from 2014), $251,400 higher than the goal</li><li>Total donations, 35 and younger: $301,079</li><li>Website visitors: 35,986</li><li>Total number of donations: 29,192</li><li>Median donation: $50</li><li>Average donation: $120</li><li>Largest donation: $25,000</li><li>Biggest giving day: December 31st ($825,622 raised from 4,983 in one day)</li><li>Most active hour: 1pm (444 Donations)</li><li>Biggest giving hour: 11am ($151,610)</li><li>Visitor demographic breakdown by age:</li><li>18-24: 5.8%</li><li>25-34: 28%</li><li>35-44: 26%</li><li>45-54: 16%</li><li>55-64: 14%</li><li>65+: 9%</li><li>Most raised for a single nonprofit: $171,084 (The Pongo Fund)</li><li>Most organization&nbsp;popular among donors 35 and under: Planned Parenthood ($28,806 raised)</li></ul>Thank you once again to everyone who made last year’s amazing results happen! We can’t wait to break the record once again in 2016.

Wrapping Up the 2015 Give!Guide

<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/Food-and-beverage-marketing-done-delicious-Ben-and-Jerrys-and-New-Belgium.jpg" alt="Food and beverage marketing collaboration between New Belgium and Ben and Jerry's"></figure>Photo credit: New Belgium BrewingI have a theory: beer and ice cream are basically the same thing.Hear me out:<ol><li>Vast quantities of either instantly improve a party.</li><li>Both can mend, or at least anesthetize, heartbreak, especially when consumed together.</li><li>Applied liberally, either can cause a hangover. (Trust me, if point #2 rings true, you’ve definitely experienced an ice cream hangover.)</li><li>Both have inspired obsessive, devoted followings among connoisseurs and DIYers.</li></ol>And now, thanks to a recent food and beverage marketing collaboration between Ben &amp; Jerry’s and New Belgium Brewing Company, these two kinds of magical, malty pints have something else in common: positive social and environmental impact.As certified B Corporations, New Belgium and Ben &amp; Jerry’s have each committed to use their businesses as forces for good. That means each company is legally accountable to demonstrate real benefit for their environment, employees, and community. If you’re unfamiliar with B Corp certification—what it entails and why it matters—make sure to read our recent blog post about the B Corp movement.What excites us about Ben &amp; Jerry’s and New Belgium, beyond the fact that they’ve taken the B Corp pledge, is their creative food and beverage marketing strategy. Proving my hypothesis once again, the companies simultaneously announced a beer-inspired ice cream and an ice cream-inspired beer last month.There’s Ben &amp; Jerry’s Salted Caramel Brown-ie Ale ice cream, bristling with caramel swirls and brownie chunks. Then there’s New Belgium’s Salted Caramel Brownie Brown Ale, an amber concoction of chocolate, vanilla, and caramel flavors. Confused yet? Remember: basically the same thing.Proceeds from both products benefit Protect Our Winters (POW) , an advocacy group that mobilizes snowboarders, skiers, and other members of the winter sports community to take action against climate change. The campaign centers on the EPA’s Clean Power Plan, which seeks to reduce carbon pollution by power plants.This is a limited release, so go grab some socially responsible ice cream and a six-pack ASAP! I mean, you were probably about to anyway, right?And for more beer—I mean ice cream—I mean… beer cream (?) check out our blog, where you’ll find posts like the one from back in 2013 when we dreamed up a bunch of ice cream flavors inspired by our hometowns.

New Belgium and Ben & Jerry’s Collaboration Is Delicious… In More Than One Way

<blockquote><figure class="image"><img src="/assets/bcorpheader1.png"></figure>“You cannot buy the revolution. You cannot make the revolution. You can only be the revolution. It is in your spirit, or it is nowhere.” – Ursula K. Le Guin</blockquote>Founded in 2006,&nbsp;B Lab&nbsp;helped spark a global movement redefining success in business. Beloved national brands Ben &amp; Jerry’s, Patagonia, Etsy and Method, and favorite local companies A to Z Wineworks, Fishpeople, Yogi Tea, Neil Kelly (and yours truly) have all voluntarily committed to higher standards of transparency, accountability and performance to be B Corp certified.&nbsp;The good news is that today more than 1,500 companies representing 130 industries, in 42 countries are B Corp certified. If you assume a constant rate of certification, that pencils out to approximately 20 new B Corps taking the Impact Assessment and joining the community every month.That’s great news, right!?&nbsp;&nbsp;The bad news is there are only 1,500 certified B Corps. . .&nbsp;According to the US Census Bureau there are over&nbsp;28 million small-/medium-sized&nbsp;businesses in America. Even conservatively estimating that less than 1% of those businesses would be able meet the requirements to become a B Corp – that’s still more than just a few potential new B Corps. Unfortunately at the current rate it would take decades – no scratch that, it would actually take centuries – to verify and certify that many businesses.&nbsp;&nbsp;So what more can we (individuals and B Corp businesses) do to help?Movements are about mobilizing people behind a shared purpose. Movements can start out with just a small group of people who believe passionately in something and with a little luck can spread like wildfire. Remember the&nbsp;Ice Bucket Challenge&nbsp;for ALS research? Or the&nbsp;Kony 2012&nbsp;video campaign? Today anyone with a video camera and social media accounts can put out a call to action and hope it goes viral (kittens help with the viral part).For the B Corp movement to really succeed and affect massive change, there are three distinct and disparate audiences we need to reach and enroll:<ol><li>Business owners and thought leaders: we need them to sign up, take the Impact Assessment and join the community.</li><li>Policy makers and government staff : we need them to enact rules and incentives for facilitating B Corp incorporation and recognition.</li><li>Consumers: we need them to seek out and prioritize companies, products and services that have the Red B label indicating certification.&nbsp;(this one, by the way, is the most important of all.)</li></ol>In the next two decades, three billion people are expected to enter the middle class. According to GlobeScan and BBMG, about one third of these new shoppers are “aspirationals,” a segment of consumers defined by their love of shopping, desire for responsible consumption, and their trust in brands to act in the best interest of society.Despite the marketing, promotion and use of the B Corp logo on products, advertisements and digital assets, still not nearly enough people know what B Corp means, and why it matters. If the goal is to change purchasing and consumption habits on a massive scale, we need to reach mainstream middle-American consumers with varying or no interest in sustainability.&nbsp;So, join us in this revolution. Whether you’re already a B Corp, or a business that aspires to it, or just a conscious consumer, there’s more we can do to make a bigger impact.<ul><li>Look up your favorite companies to see if they are a B Corp. Buy their products and services.</li><li>If you’re a B Corp, reach out and recruit other businesses that have shared values and culture. During the rigorous review process, provide these B Corp hopefuls with encouragement, mentoring and support.</li><li>Attend local events and talk about B Corp’s vision to spread awareness, create good and ignite worldwide change.</li><li>Meet up with other B Corps to share tips and tools for success, or seek help/advice with a business challenge.</li><li>Find ways to collaborate with other B Corps, and buy their products and services.</li><li>Talk to consumers — ask them if they are passionate about buying products and services from businesses that align with B Corp values.&nbsp;Share that information with B Lab, community leaders and change agents.</li></ul>This latter piece is critically important. A tiny symbol on the back of a bottle of beer or bag of flour is not going to jump off the shelf and change anyone’s mind as they’re walking down the aisles at Whole Foods, much less in Walmart, where many a B Corp brands are carried.&nbsp;Ultimately the goal should be to have the B Corp red B logo be as ubiquitous as Nike’s Swoosh or Apple’s apple.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="/assets/Screen-Shot-2015-11-30-at-11.03.47-AM-300x284.png" alt="Screen Shot 2015-11-30 at 11.03.47 AM"></figure>How to make that happen? It starts with better communication with consumers. The more we understand and can demonstrate what consumers want and prefer because of their values, the easier it will be to&nbsp;convince businesses to put that logo on the front of their package. (By the way, it will also help encourage more businesses to become a B Corp.)&nbsp;The rise of B corps is a reminder of the idea companies&nbsp;can be both profitable and charitable – not necessarily by how they spend their money, but how they make it. As individuals, we should engender for&nbsp;our work to be meaningful as well as profitable. It’s way beyond&nbsp;time for more companies to do the same and measure what matters.Let’s be clear, we’re aiming for nothing less than sparking a new normal&nbsp;– the conscious consumer, and sustained changes in our behaviors and lifestyles. Let’s #bthechange.

Join the B Corp Revolution

As our clients know, we Griffs have never shied away from a challenge. It’s in our DNA to do things differently, to do things better.That’s why we are excited to announce that we have recently earned our B Corp certification.We had a suspicion that we were living the B Corp values, so we put ourselves to the test and emphatically tossed our hat in the ring to join the ranks of the few. Companies like New Seasons Market, A to Z Wine Works and Neil Kelly, Patagonia and Warby Parker who recognize that business can be both profitable and good.But what does that even mean? Technically, it means this. It also means that we are living the dream. It means that we are taking all the decisions we make and the work we do and harnessing it to drive socially responsible change in our community and our environment.We earned our certification through B Lab, a nonprofit that serves a global movement of entrepreneurs using the power of business to solve social and environmental problems.&nbsp;It was an intense, almost year-long process that examined everything from our current business practices and future sustainability goals to our legal qualifications.Only 1,300 companies worldwide have met this challenge and only 53 in Oregon. The rigorous standards and ongoing verifications take work. The kind of work we are&nbsp;excited to do.In a nutshell: B Corps focus on doing good work that uses the power of private enterprise to create public benefit.&nbsp;As B Lab described it: B Corp certification is to sustainable business what LEED certification is to green building or Fair Trade certification is to coffee.As we celebrate our 40th anniversary this year, we Griffs look forward to celebrating 40 more years as part of the B Corp community and look forward to seeing the change it will bring and the good we can do.&nbsp;

Hooray for B Corp certification!

Hey folks, it’s with great pride that we announce our 40th year in business. With our first four decades in the rearview mirror, we thought the best way to celebrate was with a year-long launch of some fun personal initiatives — and we want to share the first of those with you!&nbsp;These are pet projects of our own that could live on and do good in their own ways. Anyone here was free to develop an idea. The creative brief: Dream it up and set it loose into the world with a little love, and a whole lot of why not.Here’s what some of our projects look like (and the year ain’t over yet)! Check them out, honorary Griffs! Let us know what you think.Pet project no. 1: Have a Nice Idea Our ECD Andy Askren had this idea: there had to be some pretty funny/amazing/inspiring, no-rulebook-for-it stories about advertising just sitting there—untold—in the collective experiences of top-notch creative people right here in Portland. Stories the creative world needed to hear. Totally valuable, probably at least slightly entertaining. So we got to telling those stories and the result was the Have a Nice Idea podcast series. You can find it on iTunes and Twitter @haveaniceideaPet project no. 2: SqoochOur Web Developer/Ninja, Joey Yax, likes to tinker. He noticed something — with so many streaming music services available, and this one merging with that one, he wondered why there wasn’t an easy, elegant way to transfer/replicate/migrate carefully curated playlists from one service to another. So he tinkered. And out came Sqooch, a free app that allows you to switch your music and playlists between Spotify and Beats Music (Rdio coming soon)! Even Kanye’s not going to complain about this. Find Sqooch on the web or Twitter @sqoochapp.You can keep tabs on the rest of our pet projects and old favorites on the blog, but also on the GB40th page! Tweeple, feel free to follow us @GradyBritton.

We’re Celebrating the Big 4-0

One of our favorite-ever campaigns is the BirdSpotter Photo Contest we created for Bob’s Red Mill. Our goal: to introduce Bob’s to birdwatchers (or “birders” as people in-the-know call them), who we discovered are equally as passionate about wholesome, naturally-sourced whole grain products. So we partnered with one of the world’s foremost birding associations, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, whose dedicated Facebook followers had never been marketed to by a non-bird specific product or brand.Can you see where we’re going with this? If you guessed “Ooh, ooh, you’re going to use hypertargeting!” well, you get a gold star for paying attention. This campaign is a perfect example of how to hypertarget a niche audience with the added nuance a co-branded sponsorship.We created a birding photo contest sponsored by Bob’s that ran on the Cornell Lab’s Facebook page—a platform connected to (at the time) a community of over 100,000 birding enthusiasts who already loved to share their own photos on Facebook.The results were instantaneous and even better than we hoped for over its six months:<ul><li>Fans uploaded 80 photos on the first day alone</li><li>Nearly 5,000 photos were entered</li><li>47,000+ votes for winners cast</li><li>The contest tab was viewed more than 102,000 times</li><li>Overall impressions of Cornell Lab posts about the contest reached 3.2 million, with 86,700 people liking, commenting, and sharing the contest content.</li></ul>We have no hesitation in calling the campaign a hit. Bob’s was able to forge a lasting partnership with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that lead to more hypertargeted contests and projects, which is awesome considering their Facebook page now has nearly four times the Likes it had when we got started.How did we know Bob’s was primed for a hypertargeting campaign? We’re glad you asked:We started by looking at shared brand values. By finding a collaborator that shares your values, you essentially broaden your audience. You tell consumers who might be unfamiliar with or skeptical of your product, “Hey, we care about this too!”Bob’s Red Mill already had a very strong hunch they shared values with birders, so we confirmed that hunch using a quick poll of Cornell Lab’s Facebook fans, and discovered birders were aligned with Bob’s in their commitment to taking care of themselves and their world with wholesome, earth-friendly foods. The cherry on top? They already knew they should have whole grains in their diet. But only about half even knew about Bob’s Red Mill.Next step was to make those shared values obvious to the birding community in a way that tapped into the authentic behavior of the group. We didn’t want to seem opportunistic, which is why we went with a contest that not only rewarded people for participating (with great product and swag, of course), but also supported Cornell Lab’s citizen science efforts through donations and promotion of key Cornell programs.The approach worked because it put the community first: Bob’s was able to tap into a preexisting hobby–posting their bird photos to Facebook to share with the birding world–and support the birding community’s conservation and education efforts in a meaningful way.This is just one example of the kinds of co-branding opportunities you can pursue through hypertargeting. Imagine the other possibilities: hotels and transportation, footwear and camping gear, beer and burgers, productivity apps and personal finance apps…the list goes on, and those are just the obvious partnerships.Now that you know what hypertargeting is, how it works, and how to use it, an infinite number of connections and opportunities await. Now get out there, think creatively, and target responsibly!

Hypertargeting 401: Co-Branding Relationships With Big Brand Impact

Our GB grant program allows us to work with really cool organizations we wouldn’t get to work with otherwise: killer nonprofits with basically no marketing budgets. We always seem to have the (very) good fortune of selecting grant winners who are passionate about who they’re helping and who love great creative work. It’s consistently been a match made in advertising heaven.This year is no exception. For 2014 grant winner Marathon Scholars, our 7th grant winner so far, we’ve created a way to tell their story that is unique, touching, and gets right to the heart of why they deserve your attention. Their challenge is very few people knew they exist, so our job is to create a much higher level of visibility for their mentoring and scholarship program.Some quick background on Marathon Scholars: it’s a comprehensive college-completion program that pairs low-income students – or “scholars” – with adult mentors, who stick with these kids as they make their journey toward a college degree. Mentorship is just one part of the program, which also provides direct support services and scholarships that give students the full support they need to turn their higher education dreams into a reality.Sounds amazing, right? What’s even more amazing are the very unique, special relationships these mentors and scholars form over the years. We thought to ourselves: how do we get to the heart of those relationships so Portlanders get it? How do we make sure they get that without mentorship and help, these kids wouldn’t reach their full potential?That’s when Listen In was born. Inspired by Story Corps and launched earlier in 2015, Listen In allows the world to do just that – listen in on conversations between scholars and their mentors, who have forged a bond that will help the former stay on track in their journey toward a college degree, and provide an incredible, life-changing experience for the latter.&nbsp;There’s no video to distract; just voices, telling their story. It’s the kind of experience that inspires you to close your eyes and just…listen.This summer, the very first class of Marathon scholars prepares to graduate from college after joining the program as third graders. Listen In is a celebration of that incredible journey, and will help to celebrate every graduating class to come.We’ll begin talking to local media about the Listen In project and the first graduating class in June. We’ll also start sharing stories through some radio advertising, so keep your ears open and check out this wonderful organization. Maybe it will inspire you the way it’s inspired us.

Meet Marathon Scholars: GB’s 2014 Grant Winner

We’ve covered off on ways that you can target people across Spotify and Pandora. Now we’ll get into the even geekier ways to target people through Facebook advertising, which offers segmenting by demographics, psychographics and behavior—all provided by users. Thanks, Facebook!Targeting galore via Facebook (AKA 19% of the world’s population).<ul><li>Demographics — Ex. location, age, language</li><li>Psychographics — Ex. preferences, interests, hobbies</li><li>Behavior — Ex. shopping habits, mobile use</li></ul>Each one of the above components has the potential to slim down your Facebook advertising campaign’s audience to only the most meaningful handful of individuals you’d like to reach, for a much more budget-friendly solution. The science is in choosing the right mix of filters to develop your segment.Consider the difference, for example, between someone who likes The Hunger Games Trilogy and someone who likes “Hunger Games,” or people who live in Austin versus people who grew up there, or those interested in McDonald’s and those interested in “McDonald’s legal cases.” These subtle differences aren’t just the things that us marketers geek out about during Friday at 4 happy hours, it’s the stuff of dreams … or at least the stuff that stands to help you reach the right people with your advertisement in a cost effective way.We create targeted ads and interpret correlations from the results, which give us even more data to experiment with. If we started by targeting people who are interested in McDonald’s legal cases and discovered through advertising that we’re reaching primarily those 16–28 who live in New York and San Francisco, that’s great stuff to work with for future marketing efforts. Rooted in insight, a $100 ad can go further than a billboard in reaching its intended audience.Here’s a breakdown of the Facebook hypertargeting process from start to finish:<ol><li>Choose an objective. Objectives range from publicity to conversions, and include actions on and off Facebook. You can promote your website, boost conversion rates on a landing page, fish for Facebook Likes, get video views, or any one of a host of actions you’d like a someone to take.</li><li>Target by demographics. Start with demographics: location (country, state, and city), age range, gender, and language. Further demographics include job and family status, income and net worth, education level, ethnicity, and more.</li><li>Target by interests. This is where things become truly multidimensional. Be as broad or specific as you’d like—you could target people who like music, or pop music, or Katy Perry; or who misspell her name “Katie Perry,” or who hate Katy Perry; or all, or any combination thereof. Or foodies who are into hot dog variations. Or gambling nudists who like “anything funny.”</li><li>Target by behaviors. Have members of your audience bought a car in the last six months? Did they just come back from a vacation? Have they refused to upgrade to a new iPhone? Do they donate to environmental causes? Are they fashionistas who buy a lot of gifts for friends and family? Do they spend inordinate amounts of money online? Each behavior allows you to devise, with precision, an audience receptive to your offer.</li><li>Dance because you’re hypertargeting now.</li><li>Set your budget. Ideally, the more specific your hypertargeting parameters, the smaller your budget should be. Broad campaigns, on the other hand, call for broad spending.</li><li>Create your ad. Create the perfect ad. Craft your messaging to resonate with the audience you’ve defined, upload an image or several (more images equal more chances to determine the perfect one) and place your order.</li><li>Test, tweak, repeat. Once your ad is up and running, make sure to monitor its performance and make adjustments as necessary.</li></ol>This approach, as well as the information you gain from hypertargeting, has applications outside of Facebook and even apart from advertising. Hypertargeting data tell you about what an audience values, deepening interactions on social media and sometimes revealing novel&nbsp;and lucrative market opportunities.One last post in this hypertargeting series! What else are you interested in? Feel free to leave some comments below or reach out to us @GradyBritton on Twitter.

Hypertargeting 301: Maximize Demographics, Psychographics and Behaviors for Your Brand

There’s some important marketing lessons to be learned from The LEGO Movie. Catchy theme song that spreads via WOM wildfire? Check. Subject matter that is good for all target demographics? Check. Branded content success story? Check check check.Is The LEGO Movie a milestone in marketing, marking the moment where audiences are now ready to recognize branded content for its artistic merits? How did we get to a point when people think a two-hour toy commercial should be judged alongside, say, The Tale of Princess Kaguya?Simple. The LEGO Movie is not a commercial. The company explicitly said so. Which brings us to the first rule of using branded content as a marketing tool:<h3>Rule #1: Branded Content Is Not a Commercial</h3>While it can and should accomplish the same goals—higher sales, increased brand recognition—content does not resemble or function like traditional advertising. Rather than existing primarily to promote a product, branded content is a product. That means a few things:<ul><li>&nbsp;It must have value. Consumers trust branded content more than they do other forms of advertising, and even more than they trust journalists. They’re primed to tune in, but brands need to continually earn that trust by offering something more than thinly-veiled advertising. Value proves content is worth one’s time.</li><li>It can become its own revenue stream. Sure, a branded iPhone app is a nice way to reach out to consumers through a new channel. But add in in-app purchases, and it becomes something more. Maybe it starts to pay for itself. Unlike dedicated publishing companies, brands can make money directly from content but don’t always have to. So you’re free to try new approaches without the expectation of their immediate payoff.</li><li>It doesn’t sell itself. Some brands dedicate marketing resources toward publicizing their content; others partner with distribution platforms. In either case, the mechanisms of conventional marketing are reorienting away from straight advertising and toward content promotion. Nothing beats content in terms of efficacy, but only if you’re getting it out there.</li></ul><h3>Rule #2: Quality and Strategic Focus Are Equally Important</h3>Branded content is Daft Punk, not Hall and Oates. What I mean by that is: both carry equal weight and work in tandem to accomplish more than the sum of their parts.When the needs of the brand outweigh the needs of the content, the result is disingenuous fluff: a bland listicle stamped with a corporate logo.But when brands overemphasize the quality of their content and forget to focus on their overall strategy, consumers lose the connection between the incredible movie they’re watching and the company funding it.When it works, brand and content should seem inseparable — and strike a harmonious balance: the tune that plays in your head when you reach for a bag of chips, or the hilarious video you look up to share with a friend by Googling the associated brand name.<h3>Rule #3: The Brand Does Not Own the Story</h3>You are not the sole arbiter of your brand, nor do you always own your content. Though it sounds a little scary, you have to listen to feedback and trust creators and consumers to determine excellence for themselves. Branded content is not a fixed idea, but a two-way conversation. As Linda Boff, GE’s executive director of global marketing, says:Don’t interrupt and hit people over the head until they get the message. Find a way to be part of the dialogue, or else just listen.Smart brands embrace others’ contributions and reactions to their branded while gently setting boundaries. It’s the difference between saying “cool idea—thanks for playing along with us” and “you’ll be hearing from our lawyers.”Come back next time for a few sources of inspiration: branded content’s “best in show.”

How Branded Content Fits Into the Marketing Mix: 3 Rules

I was cooking dinner the other night and was so tuned into a fascinating podcast&nbsp;that I&nbsp;dropped a jar of&nbsp;salsa all over the floor. (That’s not a euphemism. It happened. It was messy.)The something was episode 551 of the Splendid Table. There was a segment about cacao, an interview with John Gorham of Toro Bravo… It was all pretty interesting, and I encourage you to listen to the episode. But what led to my salsa fiasco came in around the 24–minute mark:Culinary diplomacy.For those unfamiliar with the term, culinary diplomacy is what research consultant and culinary diplomat Sam Chapple-Sokol calls “an instrument to create cross-cultural understanding in the hopes of improving interactions in cooperation.” Or, to put it simply, “using food to get along with people, to talk with people and to get to know them better.”Talk about a dream job.&nbsp;The Splendid Table feature touches on a variety of topics facing two of Grady Britton’s core industries: food and beverage, and tourism and destination marketing. If you’re involved in either industry (or you like, you know, eating and/or traveling), the segment may leave you thinking about both in an entirely new way.Take Chapple-Sokol’s first anecdote, for example. In 2002, to drive tourism to its country, the Thai government launched the Global Thai program, which incentivized chefs to go abroad and open Thai restaurants in other countries in order to introduce more eaters to Thai cuisine. Today, there are nearly 10,000 Thai restaurants around the world (a little less than half the worldwide number of Starbucks locations), and tourism to Thailand has grown by 163% since 2000, from 10 million visitors to 26.74 million visitors in 2013. Mind you, that’s after the 2003 SARS scare, the 2004 tsunami, and years of global recession.Clearly, at least for Thailand, the approach worked. It was and still is a radically different way to think about destination branding. In lieu of a marketing campaign, consumers get to experience a preview of a destination before visiting—a literal taste of what’s to come. It works because food is often our first immersive experience with a different culture.Food isn’t just food; it is culture. Through its flavor, rituals, and ingredients, food tells cultural stories. We learn different ways to eat and taste. Our palettes reconfigure. We’re taught what to look for, how to tell if a dish is prepared authentically or not. We discover cultural similarities and differences, along with our own preferences and biases. And often, we pick up some new words along the way.Sounds a lot like travel, doesn’t it? But culinary diplomacy has equally vast implications for food manufacturers and preparers.In food and beverage marketing, the number one strategy is trial: you test out a new product before you start scaling its supply chain.Culinary diplomacy takes trial to a whole new level.<ul><li>If you think of a country as a super-brand, one that’s developed through centuries of influence and iteration, food is a pathway. Cuisine not only helps a destination gauge and grow its global interest; it acts as a representative of the brand.</li><li>Food is a cultural export. For restaurants, cooks, and food and beverage distributors and manufacturers, this means both a responsibility and an opportunity: a responsibility to represent the “brand” (the culture or cultures the food comes from) and an opportunity to define the brand through personal expression of a culture. For people who have never visited Thailand, an individual Thai chef’s take on tom yum can stand in for the entire country.</li></ul>In truth, culinary diplomacy isn’t that far removed from my real job, or what we at Grady Britton help our clients achieve every day. We have to weigh the same considerations: what flavors and stories do we expose our client’s audience to? What does our marketing message say about a brand culture, and what does it leave out?So, PDX folks: what would go in Portland’s media kit? What would you pick to represent our city, or Thailand, or your own cultural destination? Play culinary diplomat along with us and leave a comment, or reach out to us on Facebook with your thoughts.

Progress doesn’t sit still here.

Media Inquiries