Are you ready for the Winter Olympic games? You may have noticed that Coca-Cola® has been gearing up.
You might have seen the Coca-Cola®
snowball commercial or the collectible cans…but have you checked out the
website? You can get into your own snowball fight or go snowboarding. Pretty
cool.
This year, Insight's gift to our clients was a board game.
Called Launch: A Classic Christmas Campaign, the game is all about putting together an ad campaign.
Players move around the board collecting cards to show they've launched various media components, interact with Santa's capricious reindeer, and race to the finish.
Working on this project was fun. Of course, repeated testing was necessary in order to refine game action and instructions. In other words, we spent a lot of time playing games in the conference room.
We've also made an online version, so everyone can play! Check it out here.
Starting with the
logo, Office Peeps has also rolled out the new look on their website,
storefront signage, and print materials. A teaser newspaper campaign slowly
revealed the company’s new identity during the week of the unveiling.
Insight Marketing
Design was excited to rebrand the 50-year old office sales and service
business. We created a complete array of integrated campaign components.
"We learned
that the company’s greatest value and strength was its employees,” said Insight
Principal, Candy Van Dam. “The rebranding puts the emphasis on people, rather
than products.”
Not that products
aren’t important. Office Peeps carries over 50,000 products, and offers them at
competitive, low prices. “By being part of buying groups, Office Peeps’
purchasing power rivals that of any mass merchandiser,” said Van Dam.
“But because the
staff is so experienced, many with 20 or 30 years at the company, they really
know the products – and the customers – inside and out,” she said.
After waiting in storage for a whole year, Insight's Little Red Stocking campaign window became a Parade of Lights float for this year's parade.
This year's project didn't take nearly as long as last year, but we did have to re-think the entire display. It's one thing to figure out how to make 8' pieces of cardboard stand in an enclosed window...quite a different thing to figure out how to keep them from being blown over on a moving trailer.
There were some great floats out there and we were just thankful we made it through the entire parade without a problem. We tip our hats to the other float builders with whom we now share a common bond of float construction and all its labors.
For me it was my first time a.) attending the Parade of Lights and b.) building a float. I was amazed by not only the number and scale of the entries but also by the awesome creative and engineering thought that went into them. I may have found a new calling. Who needs a float built next year? I'm ready to begin construction.
It was also the largest crowd that I have ever seen in Sioux Falls. People filling the sidewalks, looking from the tops of parking garages, and from the 6th floor balcony at the Holiday Inn. I definitely plan on attending next year.
Insight was just notified that we won 11 MarCom Awards for 2009 (loud applause)!
Just for the record -- no, we didn't send in 50 entries. Just 16. And yes, we had competition, with nearly 5,000 entries.
Also, for the record, we like the little statuettes MarCom Awards bring.
Here's how we did:
• Four Platinum Awards -- the highest honor -- for
• Four Gold Awards for the “DSU 2.0 Invitation” for Dakota State University Foundation; the “Chicago TV Spot” for the Sioux Empire Community Theatre; the “Does it Hurt When You?” advertising campaign for Open Upright MRI of South Dakota and a television campaign, “It’s Turkey Time,” for the South Dakota Poultry Industry Association.
• Three Honorable Mentions, for the “Enjoy the Scenery” Season Poster and the Season
Illustration for the Sioux Empire Community Theatre; and the logo, letterhead
and business cards for Chicagoland Community Church.
The MarCom Awards is an international creative competition that recognizes outstanding achievement by marketing and communications professionals. It is administered and judged by the Association of Marketing and Communications Professionals.
Yes, Insight has been published. Not in an artsy little zine that three people in San Francisco read. Not in a brochure of Addy® winners. Not in a book we created ourselves (good idea, though).
In fact, Insight's work now appears in two books so legit you can find them at your local big box bookstore, or order them from your favorite local independent bookstore. Or online.
They're big books. The kind you'd find on a coffee table in a really cool house. Or in the art department of an ad agency.
The Big Book of Green Design, 2009, Collins Design, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishing, New York, includes four pieces created by Insight.
Edited by Suzanna Stephens and Anthony Stephens, The Big Book of Green Design features top green design materials created worldwide.
Another title in the "Big Book" design series, The Big Book of Self-Promotion from the same publisher, also hot off the press, contains several pieces from Insight. These include holiday books A Classic Christmas Tail and A Classic Christmas Tail 2.
The Big Book of Self-Promotion contains work from more than 500 design firms worldwide, showcasing the freshest, most inventive ideas used by these companies to promote themselves.
Donal McLaughlin was given the assignment to design an emblem for the United Nations Conference in 1945. So, at the age of 38, he was challenged with the task of designing an original pictorial image in conjunction with the words "The United Nations Conference on International Organization, San Francisco, 1945". This new emblem was to be used on a round button, measuring 11/16ths of an inch. Not even 3/4ths.
Mr. McLaughlin created a map of the continents, with the United States front and center on the vertical axis. Another designer from his team added olive branches as a symbol of peace.
This design was adopted as the the official United Nations seal and emblem one year later, in 1946. Donal recommended and produced minor modifications that same year.
We lost Donal McLaughlin last month at the age of 102. He left behind a legacy of graphic design and architecture. But, his most monumental creation was a small button. You can read this story in it's entirety in the New York Times or the Washington Post. Thank you Mr. McLaughlin for the years of hard work and inspiration.
Take eleven co-workers, transport them clear across the state, and deposit them in a sprawling house for four days. Add a couple of hours of discussions, followed by lots of playtime in the beautiful Black Hills.
Looking back on August and September, we've launched some outstanding websites. Here's a peek:
Henry Carlson Company
Henry Carlson Company (HCC) asked Insight to create a website that would instantly communicate to visitors that HCC is the premier general contractor in this region. Insight developed a design direction that was unique and cried out CONSTRUCTION. The site features silhouettes of workers engaged in many aspects of building construction. Flip around the site to see different actions. (Also note that the figures are all wearing proper safety equipment.)
Chicagoland Community Church
The Chicagoland Community Church wanted a fresh, new look that would appeal to 20- and 30-something urban church-goers. Insight created a number of pieces for the church, including this awesome website. The site incorporates the church blog and features a rotating flash navigation at the top.
Ask the CEO
Security First Bank wanted to start an online conversation with customers through an "Ask the CEO" column. Insight suggested the use of a custom formatted blog to not only allow for question submission but also to create a gallery of the answers. Posts are arranged in categories for organization and search-ability. It is our hope that in the future this blog could serve as a search-able FAQ section for the site.
What do you think? We'd love to hear your feedback!
Yesterday I was on a photo shoot with photographer Paul Heckel of Heckel Creative.
Paul is what many people would consider one of the best commercial photographers in Sioux Falls and it was fun to watch him work.
Upon walking onto a set, he evaluates lighting, composition, framing, staging of scene, and staging of talent. Then there's everything dealing with the mechanics of the camera: exposure, shutter speed, iso, camera lens, what stop to set lights, and probably a thousand other things that were too subtle for me to pick up on. All the while, he's making the talent feel relaxed and at ease.
It's not just the end result, or the photography, that's art. It's also the process.
