ChildFund began in 1938 in Richmond, VA. Founded by Dr. J. Calvitt Clarke, it was originally called China’s Children Fund (CCF), and was created to help children displaced by the second Sino-Japanese War. The “child sponsorship” concept we know today stemmed from Dr. Clarke’s vision: one sponsor donates one amount to help one child.

The organization’s work quickly expanded to helping children around the world, and its focus shifted to addressing the devastating impact of poverty on children’s lives and communities. In 1951, the name was changed to Christian Children’s Fund, and by the 1960’s CCF was assisting over 36,000 children in 50 countries. In 1985, more than 325,000 children were sponsored by CCF. Today, the organization reaches over 15 million children and family members in 31 countries.

Recognizing that the complex and multiple challenges now facing children around the world requires a globe-spanning organization that can substantially impact the lives of children in need, CCF became a founding partner of the ChildFund Alliance, comprised of 12 like-minded international children’s organizations.

In 2009, CCF became ChildFund International.  As part of its rebranding initiative, J H I was asked to write and design a six panel brochure that could effectively communicate the organization’s 5 Year Strategy to a wide range of stakeholders, in multiple languages, and in countries around the world. The resulting piece, “Positive Outcomes, Lasting Change” recently received a First Place award in the Virginia Press Women’s 2010 communication contest, and will advance to the National Federation of Press Women contest.

It’s always nice to win awards. But it’s even better to be a part of changing the world.

We have had the pleasure of working with the Visual Arts Center of Richmond for several years. Recently they introduced an amazing new program, Creativity at Work. It’s a twice yearly, intensive workshop that brings together artists and business leaders (present and future) to explore the creative process and apply it to workplace challenges. In today’s global marketplace, the ability to bring fresh thinking and innovative ideas to the table will be critical for success. As one of the area’s leading creative resources, VisArts is helping to shape business leaders – and the future of our community. Pretty cool, huh? To learn more about it, go to www.visarts.org.

We recently completed an exciting project in collaboration with Virginia Tourism Corporation and our friends at Richmond Metropolitan Convention & Visitor’s Bureau (RMCVB) and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. With the main goal to promote the Grand Opening of the VMFA museum expansion on May 1, we created a special edition of the “History” campaign that will be installed in the Gallery Place station in the DC Metro.

The campaign brings together the look and bright colors of the History campaign featuring beautiful pieces from various VMFA collections. The creative will “dominate” the entire lower platform and turn the station into a fine art gallery!

This beautiful campaign will be up for four weeks in April at Gallery Place on the yellow line, just in time for the May 1, 2010 grand opening of the museum. If making a trip on the metro in April, be sure to check out J H I’s work!

For over 20 years, Better Housing Coalition has been changing lives and transforming communities through high quality affordable housing. BHC is nationally recognized for its innovative approach, from building green to providing support services that help each neighborhood flourish. In 2009, BHC launched its annual leadership awards, to honor those whose leadership inspires positive change in the greater Richmond community (and to raise money, in case you’re looking for a worthy cause to support). In 2010, BHC decided to name the event/awards Groundbreakers, and asked JHI to develop a logo that would be an extension of the BHC brand (which JHI also developed). The final choice was a colorful constellation of shovels, illustrating the endless and wonderful possibilities that can happen when we all dig in and help.

]]> http://jhigoodidea.com/theblog/good-ideas-good-thinking/feed 0 http://jhigoodidea.com/theblog/history-open-for-all http://jhigoodidea.com/theblog/history-open-for-all#comments Thu, 11 Feb 2010 18:18:37 +0000 Christen http://jhigoodidea.com/theblog/?p=846 At J H I, we have the pleasure of working with many clients across various industries.  You can imagine why we love our jobs – it never gets stale!  We have a long standing relationship with the Richmond Metropolitan Convention and Visitor’s Bureau (RMCVB) and developed their current “History” advertising campaign.

Our clients at RMCVB recently approached us with a new demographic to target – the GLBT community.  We immediately got to work on the new ad concept, “History. Open for all.”  We used Richmond residents as our models and had the photo shoots in Carytown and at Stronghill Dining Company (which is delicious too!).

A central location to share and obtain information; it makes so much sense until you realize that the “marketing volume” is at a confusing,  brain-melting level. A classic and definable example of how way too much information shuts down the viewer. There is often so much to see that we can see nothing at all! We switch into self-protection mode and use our internal volume knob to turn down the experience to a more manageable level…but what is lost in the act of doing this may be the most valuable information of all.

We think that the correct strategy (in support of our “keep it focused and simple” philosophy) is to create an island of calm in the chaos. Control the experience. Offer a logical visual and auditory conversation so that the prospect gets just the message you want them to get. Don’t ask them figure it out…their brain was exhausted soon after they entered the show!

The trade show can be an extremely effective marketing investment if well conceived and executed. Let’s discuss your next event…

Photo by Ishtar (http://www.igougo.com/journal-j6573-Istanbul-The_Wait_for_Turkey_-_Finally.html) Thank you!