Creative Director
When Warren Buffet went on record in 2014 saying that Omaha needed more lodging options for his annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting, he went on to single out Airbnb as an emerging alternative to traditional hotel bookings. Airbnb took notice and went to work developing an outreach and awareness program in Omaha.
Airbnb’s internal team contracted an influencer outreach marketing firm, who then brought in my team to develop and execute an on-the-ground campaign.
We recruited and managed a dynamic team of smart, outgoing individuals to work events around the city that would reach our target audience and engage prospective hosts in a dialogue about Airbnb. Events ranged from drop-ins with a complimentary coffee cart at local tech companies to a weekend crafts show to a St. Patrick’s Day concert.
The centerpiece of the campaign, however, was a pop-up store in Omaha’s Old Market. We procured the space, planned the layout, and managed our brand ambassadors who staffed the store. The space was laid out to feel like a living room, with comfortable seating, funky urban décor, a crowdsourced photo mural, and iMacs for going through the Airbnb signup process. Since the concept was new to many Omahans, our brand ambassadors were there to answer questions and provide one-on-one consultation. The pop-up shop also served as an event space for several community events we held throughout the campaign.
This was a story of reach, engagement, and buzz. At the close of the campaign, we had tripled the total number of active Airbnb listings in the Omaha area. That number exceeded the campaign goal by 18%. We reached 1,874 people in the real world via one-to-one introductions and rich engagements, exceeding our goals by 44%. Online, our reach was amplified via 624,817 digital impressions across blogs, local news sources, and social media. All of this momentum led to three local TV news stations running stories on the campaign.
Creative Director
Wells Enterprises hired my team to develop and execute an engagement strategy for its 2nd St. Creamery super premium ice cream brand with the tagline “Super Good Ice Cream.” The target audience was Millennials.
We expanded their brand narrative of “Super Good” by relishing in the super goodness that is summer, playing up the natural connection between ice cream and nostalgia and fun that is the hallmark of the season. The campaign zeroed in on influential Millennials, who we dubbed “Influennials,” in three test markets in the Midwest: Omaha, Des Moines, and Kansas City.
An ice cream truck on steroids, our road tour featured a branded Airstream trailer as our mobile sampling unit. The campaign blended awareness and trial with deeper engagement and buzz generation.
Leveraging existing relationships while cultivating new ones, we launched our experiential strategy by highlighting individuals doing “Super Good” things around their communities, yielding a collection of videos and photo essays we called the “Spotlight Series.”
Our event strategy was a blend of producing small and medium-scale pop-up events at key social hubs and affiliating with several existing, larger-scale events. We integrated the product into the scene organically, while capturing stories at each event.
The Flavor of the Scene Tour engaged over 20,000 people with the brand over a relatively short period of time, giving the brand the velocity it needed to successfully penetrate these new markets.
In the absence of a previously defined brand personality, the campaign ended up shaping much of the brand strategy going forward. It also earned several Gold ADDY awards, including in the nontraditional campaign category.
Video Series Director / Producer
I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN
It’s no secret that soccer is the most popular sport in the world. But for decades, the big question when it came to soccer in the United States was: Will it ever catch hold here? Relegated to the back page of the sports section and the occasional mention on SportsCenter, soccer lived on the fringes.
At the 2014 men’s World Cup in Brazil, there were more fans from the United States than other country save the host nation. And the unofficial fan group of US Soccer, The American Outlaws, were the largest, loudest, and best organized supporter group of any team at the Cup. We know because we were there. We were there when tens of thousands of voices belted out the Star Spangled Banner in Natal before the first match, against Ghana. And we were there when the stadium in Manaus erupted in pandemonium after Jermaine Jones rocketed the equalizer against powerhouse Portugal..
WHERE YOU GO, WE’LL FOLLOW
The American Outlaws are a cultural phenomenon. With more than 30,000 paid members and local chapters in all 50 states, they are a force to be reckoned with. They organize, they travel, and when they show up, they make their presence known. That kind of fan support has been a game changer for US Soccer. And it ain’t easy.
Imagine organizing a geographically dispersed fan group for a team with no home field. You play your home games in a bunch of cities, spread out all over the country, and your away games are in places that are hard to get to, often played in hostile stadiums that necessitate police escorts… for the fans.
CAPTURING THE STORY
We had been working with AO for a couple years already when we had the idea of documenting the US fan experience at the World Cup. Our first couple videos had gotten some nice traction on YouTube. We wanted to go bigger and, as always, The Outlaws were game. Our idea was to travel to Brazil with the fans as an embedded film crew and document the experience. What we needed was a brand to sponsor the project. A lot of pieces had to fall in place to make the dream a reality. At the same time, the smart and creative folks at Gilt Edge Marketing in Chicago were pitching their client, Unilever, on some branded content ideas for the World Cup. A partnership that brought together the marketing team at Degree for Men deodorant, Gilt Edge, The American Outlaws, and The New BLK was born at the MLS final in Kansas City, when we met and fleshed out the idea. Six months later, our five-person production crew was on a charter plane amongst The Outlaws, bound for Brazil.
EPISODES
Our task was to follow The Outlaws for as long as the US team was still playing. We filmed every day for three weeks straight, bringing back footage at the end of each day to edit. The next day, a three to four person crew would go out and shoot more scenes while one or two of us would stay behind at the hotel to edit and upload the latest episodes.
OWNED & EARNED MEDIA
We built on online hub for the project, AOInBrazil.com, as a place to channel media and fans. A primary social strategy was to leverage Instagram on the site, aggregating photos and videos from hundreds of US fans in Brazil. The Outlaws became a major part of the American World Cup story, with features appearing in Sports Illustrated, ESPN, CNN, The Today Show, and more.
Creative Director, Video Director/Producer, Writer
It's not every day you get to work with a new brand from its inception. When a group of industry veterans from the pet supply and veterinary medicine industry came together with an idea to revolutionize the way consumers get flea & tick medicine for their dogs and cats, one of the founders gave me a call. He envisioned something along the lines of the Dollar Shave Club - a subscription box service with deeply discounted flea and tick medicine and a brand with a lighthearted voice and a touch of attitude.
I led the creative team from white board and back of the napkin sketches al the way up to brand launch. The name, identity, outer packaging, inside the box packaging, and web design and UX.
I also wrote, co-produced, and co-directed a series of videos and a 30s commercial. We decided to make the mailman our hero character, flipping the traditional mailman/dog adversarial relationship on its head. The mailman is the dry humored voice of reason in a world of well-meaning but slightly clueless Millennial pet owners.
The brand launched in late November 2017 in a pilot program in three states. National rollout to follow.
Writer/Creative Director
UC Irvine's Sue and Bill Gross Stem Cell Center was one of the first dedicated stem cell research facilities in the world and home to some of the research behind the first approved human clinical trials. Funded in part by California's Prop 71, a public bond issue that raised billions of dollars for pioneering stem cell research, UC Irvine and other research facilities in California had become ground zero in the push for countless new treatments and cures for a whole host of injuries and diseases.
We were hired to develop the first advertising campaign anywhere to promote stem cell research.
Without a natural constituency of grateful patients, stem cell research faced numerous obstacles that other medical research campaigns have not.
Stem cell research is complex and abstract and long-range in its impact. It's also been highly controversial, with numerous politicians and religious leaders speaking out against it, in particular research involving human embryos.
The other context here was the UC Irvine brand. Tucked away in sunny, serene Orange County, the university brand was under-the-radar in Southern California, despite its stellar global reputation.
Our job was to make the abstract concrete, to educate and inform, but also connect with the public on an inspirational and emotional level. To top it off, we had to rally the UC Irvine community and showcase the larger university brand.
We enlisted the help of celebrities such Greg Louganis, a UC Irvine alum, along with NFL star Antonio Gates and TV personality Leeza Gibbons. We also recruited local celebrities and influencers from Orange County and the campus community.
The centerpiece of the campaign was this brand mantra video, which I wrote, and the tagline "Takes Nerve" that played off the nerve tissue as well as the courage to take action now.
We also developed outdoor, print, TV, cinema, and digital advertising that ran across Southern California.
Writer, Creative Director
Fontenelle Forest was a quiet gem in Omaha's backyard – acres of natural forest, prairies, and wetlands; miles of trails; and a vibrant nature center, with events, programs, and camps happening all the time.
But, visits to the forest had stagnated and Fontenelle struggled to expand their reach beyond its surrounding neighborhoods. They needed a bold new campaign.
These are some of the highlights of a multi-year effort that included outdoor, print, digital, video, and radio components. Over a three year period, the campaign produced a 268% increase in daily admissions to the forest.
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For the organization's annual gala fundraiser event, we were asked to produce a video that would tell the Fontenelle story, inspire the audience, and motivate them to reach into their wallets.
We decided to go for a quiet, reflective, lyrical tone that matched the experience of walking through the woods. Our concept was to show how the forest remains constant and is something we can experience throughout each stage of life.
I wrote the script, weaving in some quotations from Henry David Thoreau along with my own words. I also directed the shoot and the voice-over narration from our three on-screen characters, and directed and produced the edit.
Writer, Director, Executive Producer
A brand narrative video for an ambitious new development project – a large scale sports facility in La Vista, NE. This was also probably the most aggressive production schedule I've ever worked on. Start to finish, from proposal to final delivery, was about 3 weeks. We shot 8 straight days, 15 hour days mostly, in 11 locations with a cast of 50 people. To get the silhouetted look we were going for, we did a lot of early morning sunrises and dusk shots.
The narrative was really the glue to the piece, as it often is. I wanted a down-to-Earth tone but with some lyricism to the language. For the video to work, it needed to be genuine and inspiring, with a balance of grand vision and specific details. The video also needed a long shelf life, with an appeal to various audiences, but also make for an effective pitch piece to a very specific audience of major donors.
Fundraising Video
Writer/Creative Director
A brewery that made great beer and had a really cool look and feel was missing something – a story. "Tell us who we are," they said, "and we'll hire you right now."
That's when I wrote what we call the "brand mantra statement" and my team and I got to work putting it into video form. It was a rapid fire, run and gun kind of deal, 48 hours from start to finish.
The video is a bit rough around the edges and if I could do it all over with a little more time and money, I sure would. But, then again, we kinda touched a nerve with this one - a testament, I think, to the power of a good story.
The mantra ended up setting the style and voice for the brand from that point forward.
Since most craft breweries don't really advertise per se, their chief touchpoint is really at the point of purchase - on the shelf, at the tap handle, in the cooler. So, that's where we took the brand story next.
If you make a poster that people want to hang on their walls, they just might do that. Some of these posters haven't come down in 6 years. And the ones that have, I've been told, were mostly stolen by customers who just couldn't resist the urge to take them home.
Writer, Director
Nissan of Omaha wanted to throw out the old playbook entirely and rethink the way they sold cars. While they were re-engineering their approach to sales and service, they came to us for a fresh advertising campaign that would also be something completely different. In fact, they asked us to come right out and mock car dealerships and car salesmen. To top it off, they didn't even care if we featured any of their vehicles in the ads. Just make it funny and memorable and hammer home the point that buying a car is usually a pain.
We came back with three concepts. They loved them all, so much so that two of of the people in the room said "let's do all of 'em, like Geico!" The third person, the one who controlled the budget, called the next day with a reality check: just the one concept for now.
We cast our talent out of Chicago and flew them into Omaha for the shoot. For our location, we used the client's dealership and gave it makeover to transform it into something that felt more like a used car lot. We shot in the dead of winter, in subzero temps, and set up warming stations to keep the cast and crew from freezing in between takes.
The campaign ended up winning a few local and national TV awards and the client liked them so much, they kept running them for years.
30s TV Commercial
30s TV Commercial
30s TV Commercial
Writer, Director, Producer, Voice Talent, Puppeteer
Voodoo Taco had a fun brand – a menu full of interesting, creative ingredient combinations, a lively atmosphere, and a whimsical brand personality. They came to us to produce some TV commercials to capture that brand spirit. We needed to cut through the clutter, be memorable, generate some buzz to stretch their limited media spend, and really sell the food. No biggie.
We loved the voodoo illustrations they were already using and came up with the idea of creating voodoo dolls to be our characters. We decided to place our characters in the context of a Food Network style show, with the dolls acting as a kind of impromptu judges' panel that appears in the kitchen where the food is being prepped and in the dining area.
30s TV commercial
30s TV commercial
Writer/Creative Director/Producer
A Miami-based fashion retail brand was expanding and needed a campaign to launch the opening of their new locations. They had a loosely defined look and feel, mostly in print and environmental signage. Our task was to give the brand some definition, give it a voice, give it a POV.
Brand Narrative Video
Writer, Creative/Art Director
It's all about packaging and point-of-sale for craft breweries. For these guys, we wanted to convey their philosophy of making craft beer fun. You can be serious about your craft without taking yourself too seriously. These are fun, approachable beers.
Our brand voice is simple and conversational but also a little goofy. Visually, we wanted something cool and fun, artsy but unpretentious.
We carried the visual style over to digital, with these sharable social post graphics for Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Writer, Creative Director
To promote Fontenelle's "eco-zibit" in conjunction with the Simthonsian, we developed this campaign that largely consisted of outdoor advertising at environmentally conscious touchpoints – recycling cans, pedicabs, and Metro buses. We also developed a digital campaign, with sponsored content, display ads, pre-roll video, and a campaign microsite.
The campaign won numerous awards and garnered significant earned media.
Writer/Creative Director
In this handcrafted, foodie conscious era, most beer drinkers are still of the non-craft variety. I wanted to come up with something that would get their attention – an invitation to try some fresh, tasty beers from Omaha's brewery.
I took inspiration from amnesty programs for things like fireworks, firearms, and prescription drugs – those events where you can turn in your contraband without any questions. And I thought – why not invite the public to turn in their bad beer, their unused beer in the back of the fridge? We'd even give them a fresh six-pack of Brickway in exchange.
This was my baby and I oversaw every detail, from posters and a microsite to a public relations campaign. After we collected all the unwanted beer, we had to come up with something to do with it all, so we made that part of the story.
We showed that there are all kinds of uses for bad beer besides drinking it. We hooked up a keg to garden hose and sprinkler and watered a community garden. We made a giant beer slip 'n slide. We filled a dunk tank.
We ended up getting local and national media placements and brought a lot of new people into the brewery.
Creative Director / Writer
My client, Casa de Entrada, developed a signature cigar in partnership with Casa Fernandez, a renowned Nicaraguan producer of premium cigars. Our task was to create a new brand that would cut through the noise and stand out among the typical, regal looking cigar brands.
As co-CD and writer on the project, I chose to pay tribute to local Nicaraguan culture and history–the land and the farmers, field hands, sorters, rollers, blenders, and other laborers involved in the meticulous process of making a great cigar.
We went back to the basics, with pencil and paper, to produce a handmade look. The brand gives a nod to classic retro cigar design but is rugged with imperfections like the cracks of a working man’s hands.
We also took inspiration from Cuban, Dominican, and Central American postage stamps to give the brand a touch of the exotic and romantic.
Sales of Entrada cigars have continued to outpace production, as the branding continues to win accolades from industry publications and forums and earned Gold ADDY awards for both identity and packaging design.
