Amsterdam Inspirations feed Tampa Bay

I LOVE to travel. Seeing new places, experiencing new cultures, eating all the food… every part of traveling is good for the soul—especially a creative one.

On a recent trip to Amsterdam, Tyler and I visited the Rijks Museum, where I picked up this super cool map. Individual stair step tabs revealed an illustration of each floor of the museum and displayed the historical artifacts or specific artists that were housed there. To be honest, it was a lot to take in in the moment. But I thought it was worth bringing back to the agency as an example of an inspiring layout.

A few weeks later, our client, Feeding Tampa Bay, needed a physical representation of their strategic 5-year plan to hand out to Tampa Bay leaders at an upcoming media event. Suddenly, I had an idea of how to tell their story. With the help of a ruler, some tape, and many sheets of paper, I built a similar booklet to illustrate how this layout would be perfect to share Feeding Tampa Bay’s goal. Each strategic pillar would have its own space to shine, but when the booklet was fully opened, you could see how each piece of the plan worked together to create a hunger-free Tampa Bay.

Check out the making-of photos below, and see the finished project here.

A Mouth-Watering Word Mark

Word marks are a special kind of challenge for creative teams. Using only letters, create a distinct typographic treatment for an event, product, or brand that can stand out and be memorable. From raw ideas to marks that are really well done, you have to grill down to the essence of what this icon will represent. (Are you picking up on a theme here?)

So, when the Zoo asked us to help them advertise some spring samplin’s that were in the works to heighten their Zoo experience before peak attendance during spring break, we were fired up.

What if the word mark looked like it was written in barbecue sauce, I wondered. My sr. art director tried some things out in Photoshop, but we weren’t getting the look we wanted. So I figured, don’t fight the fonts, cook up your own. I headed into the kitchen, found some extra Chick-fil-A BBQ packets—only the best for this craft project—and grabbed some makeshift paint brushes (a stirrer straw and a plastic knife.)

What resulted was a delectable, smokey mark that you can practically smell! Now that’ll make your mouth water. You can see the process, from sketch to market, below!

Words Words Words

Words are, in my not-so-humble opinion, our most inexhaustible form of magic. -- Dumbledore/JK Rowling 

There is magic in words!

I’ve always believed that. So, I find it very ironic that I constantly tell myself and any one who takes the time to ask, that I want to be a copywriter when I “grow up”. And yet I am constantly drawn back to design.

Well, today I got to attend a copy writing seminar! Hallelujah! 

And what a workshop! If there was an ideal copy writing mentor in Cannes, this guy is it. Sam Saunders, CCO and writer at Oceanyc, is this huge, obnoxious personality that has an entertaining dirty mind along with an incredible understanding of how to wield the English language.

“Advertising is 100% an act of seduction,” says Saunders. The tagline is your pick-up line and each line of copy is bait to the next. “Your copy is only as strong as your worst line.”

In many professions you have to choose your words carefully. And in no job is this more true than in copywriting. In most cases, the space for copy in an ad is small, if anything. And with the rapid speed at which people consume information it essential that copy catches and holds their attention. Easier said than done, for sure. Here are a few of Saunders’ rules:

1. No puns or silly words — That’s too easy. Be better than that.

2. Balance — If you’re leading with a crazy visual, go for straightforward copy. And vice-versa.

3. Lead with emotion — People operate on an emotional level, use their emotions to your advantage.

4. The Manifesto — It’s the holy grail of copy. Start out with a line showing the future of the brand, its North Star. Next, hit em with the raw, emotional truth followed by what the brand brings to the table. End it strong with the brand name. And if you’re the cherry-on-top kind of creative, throw the logo up in the corner. BOOM.

Keep practicing those writing skills and stay shiny my friends!

xoxo,

Kelsie

Turner Duckworth Unmistakably Inspiring in Cannes

Design is the Future: How Unmistakable Branding Can Unleash Creativity, presented by Leo Burnett and Turner Duckworth was, by far, my favorite seminar.

They discussed how every aspect of a brand has to be seen as a creative opportunity.

Take Amazon, for example. They ship things that consumers buy from their online database. Now, it would have been super easy to put stuff in a brown box and call it done, but no! Duckworth saw that brown box as a canvas for Amazon to paint on. Originally it was just marked with the familiar smile from the logo. But if you’ve seen an Amazon box lately, you might recognize some cute little yellow friends causing mischief on the boxes. That’s right, the Minions have taken over Amazon’s canvas. So now, a regular brown box has become a visual asset that Amazon can rent out to brands.

Branding is about so much more than just a logo these days. The logo is simply a “visual receipt” for the client. As Duckworth put it, it’s about taking those visual assets and making them tangible, social objects. If a brand can pull that off, they can create their own material culture centered on their brand. If that happens, what they’ve done goes far beyond what any agency can do.

A brand culture extends to the consumer and invites them to contribute their own personal creativity to the culture. One of the speakers was flying into an airport for a conference when he noticed a billboard covered in Coke bottles. What was special about this particular billboard was that the negative space between the bottles spelled out the name of the city he was arriving in. He sent a picture to his college asking, “Is this ours?” It wasn’t. That billboard is an amazing example of what consumers can contribute when they are passionate about a material culture.

Turner and Duckworth also showcased a case study of my personal favorite brand, Coca-Cola.

They highlighted how they refocused the brand to maintain one solid, cohesive image and how that contributed to the brand’s unmistakable culture. (This was a familiar theme in multiple presentations from creative agencies.) Coke has proven itself as a creative and innovative brand that is dedicated to one simple theme of bringing people together. My favorite ad they entered at Cannes this year was of two hands reaching out as if to touch each other palm to palm. The outline of the bottle was visible in the negative space between their hands. How incredible is it that you can have such a powerful ad, that stays true to their values of connecting people, without even featuring the physical product! Unmistakably creative.

Stay shiny my friends!

xoxo,

Kelsie