Safe Place Chicago

Recently, I completed work on a print & digital campaign (with local agency, White Space) for Safe Place Chicago, who is trying to raise awareness in the Chicago area. They're working to get more people using the program, but they're also working to get more support and more businesses to step in as the actual "safe places" advertised. 

When you're aiming at kids who are living in hell, the hard part is getting away from imagery of that. Kids sleeping in dumpsters and etc... if that is indeed their reality, let's not remind them of that. Eventually, we decided to focus on the idea of looking into the eyes of a kid who has been there and made it out. It was more important to focus on the success stories than the idea of "here's where you are now," and try to put a light at the end of the tunnel. With this approach also came the clean look of everything. Much of the advertising in this area tends towards the gritty and darker look, but we thought more about the kids in the ads talking to you from the other side of everything. 

We created 4 different posters, each featuring a different kid, and then spread those across the different print pieces, such as bus and train ads, digital displays, online banner ads and even a unique bench installation.

One of the most important things we needed to push was a call to action asking teens in need to text "help" to a certain number if they felt in need. With today's teens, that's brilliant... they don't even have to talk to someone... just text help + their location and it's on the way. We decided to come up with some sort of lockup that made this highly recognizable and easy to get across, so we wrote in "text-speak," kept it short and placed it in a word bubble to reinforce the text message idea. On the posters, we also added an additional call to action, suggesting that you snap a pic of the lockup so you don't forget it. Just like the idea of texting, with camera phones everywhere, I really felt like this is a brilliant idea to suggest. 

All-in-all, it turned out to be a really slick campaign, and time will tell whether or not it serves its full purpose. White Space was great to work with on this, and brought A+ ideas to the table constantly, which always made my job easier. Well, okay... perhaps not easier... but it always made the work better.