“Do you want to spend the rest of your life
selling sugared water, or do you want
a chance to change the world?”
A quote from the Steve Jobs biography by Walter Isaacson.
Delivered by Steve during the Spring of 1983 to lure
John Sculley, then President of PepsiCo, into becoming
the new President of Apple.
Just like Apple used great design to revolutionize personal
computing, define, and then redefine existing industries:
music players, smart phones, tablets & whatever is next...
Design For Good uses great design to ignite, accelerate
and amplify design-driven social change.
Like Apple, Design For Good can revolutionize
relationships between designers, our design industry,
our communities and our design businesses.
The ideas and practices have been around for awhile, but
AIGA officially launched Design for Good in Oct 2011.
AIGA’s own Doug Powell, his family, and their incredible
journey of improving Type 1 Diabetes and general
healthcare informative materials through great solutions,
great thoughts, great awareness & great design.
The Powell’s self-initiated outcome was the core of
Design For Good’s position - combine resources,
networks, experiences and narrative in a collaborative
way to promote positive social change.
The Powell’s approach reminds me of a
great quote from Debbie Millman’s book,
Brand Thinking and Other Noble Pursuits.
Debbie Millman and Brian Collins, Chairman & Chief
Creative Officer of COLLINS in NYC, were discussing the
common description that designers are “problem solvers.”
Brian Collins offered up this quote, which I think ties in
well with Design For Good philosophies, and that is...
“Our sensibilities, as well as our sensitivities, give us
great pattern-recognition skills. We should go into
situations, communities, organizations, industries,
companies, and start looking for problems.”
Stepping back will allow us to lay
the framework for what would become the
AIGA Charlotte Design For Good Poster Initiative.
Rachel Martin, our VP of Sustainability, attended, along
with Doug Powell, and 50 other designers participated.
There were 3 days, 4 teams of 5 designers, 5 community /
organization leaders and 1 moderator per team.
They conducted working sessions to tackle, discuss,
brainstorm and collaborate on solutions that could
benefit Birmingham’s community.
Rachel, and all other participants, were moved,
energized and compelled to do more.
Rachel wanted to do something on the
ground in Charlotte to engage designers
in the area to work with nonprofits and
create positive change in our own backyard.
Rachel worked with the AIGA Charlotte Board to assess,
design, architect & administer what would become our
AIGA Charlotte Design For Good Poster Initiative.
A design summit was the original goal, but
there were concerns about a lack of adequate resources,
involvement and resources to execute it effectively.
To host an actual Design Summit, and getting city leaders
and a cause/nonprofit to work with, seemed a daunting
task and perhaps a bit too large scale to dive into just yet,
based on the culture of our creative community.
What type of event could Charlotte effectively support?
Instead, we took a small step toward this goal and
developed the Design for Good Poster Show Initiative.
We based the approach on local Charlotte
Designers working with Nonprofits and Social
Entrepreneurial Businesses, which would engage
sustainability and social responsibility.
Why a poster show initiative?
We harnessed the momentum and great success we had
from our first ever #TweetMarket event in June 2011.
Over 35 designers submitted posters based on funny,
sarcastic tweets (using 140 characters or less.)
The event was well designed and received by the
community. It was a successful event in that we had
designers coming out of the woodwork to participate.
What sectors of the community can be pulled together?
We targeted AIGA Members, Non-member creatives,
venue business owners, supporting resource partners,
Nonprofit organizations, Social Entrepreneurial
Businesses, and the general public.
Can people participate, if they can’t attend?
We provided Creative Briefs in person, in digital format
and made it as easy as possible for participants. We
provided all necessary input, along with suggestions for
topics and a list of organizations and causes.
How can everyone’s submissions look consistent and
showcase the purpose of the event effectively?
We controlled submission visuals by limiting dimensions
to a common size and orientation. This also maximized
efficiencies for supporting our resource printing partner.
We provided a cohesive visual experience for gallery
show attendees by presenting all environmental
posters in one color only and all social responsibility
posters in another one color only.
How can event materials and posters be produced in
an environmentally consciousness manner?
We provided as much information digitally as possible.
We printed all posters using recycled paper and
environmental friendly printing processes.
5th Step:
Plan beyond the initial Kick-Off event and Gallery Show
event to leverage usage and exposure.
What life beyond the Gallery Show event can
these posters experience?
We clearly informed participants that poster submissions
would become the property of AIGA Charlotte.
A website was created for the AIGA Charlotte Design For
Good Poster Initiative ( designforgoodposters.com ) and
the posters were displayed within an online gallery.
Posters were then loaned on exhibit to the Art Institute
of Charlotte for 2.5 months in Mar / May 2012.
Beyond the general public exhibition, Art Institute of
Charlotte faculty used the poster exhibit for teaching and
generating project assignments for their students.
Beyond exhibitions and online gallery displays, can the
posters be re-used in another fashion?
We have plans to exhibit during the DNC in Sep 2012 to
educate visitors & policy makers about our local nonprofit
community and designers creating positive change.
We also have plans to sell them at future
AIGA Charlotte events to raise funds.
Beyond sales, we have plans to chop, recycle and
screenprint over posters for usage as future
communication materials to AIGA Charlotte members.
We decided the poster model would be a perfect
fit and launched our AIGA Charlotte
Design for Good Poster Initiative in Sep 2011.
We challenged designers to create a poster that would
inform Charlotte area citizens about environmental and
social issues and inspire the community to create positive
change in our growing city.
Description?
“What if #TweetMarket & Eat Your Greens had a baby...
You’d have tweeters hugging trees? Umm... No. You’d
have the Design for Good Poster Initiative! Yay!”
1. ATTEND OUR AIGA CHARLOTTE DESIGN FOR
GOOD POSTER INITIATIVE KICK-OFF
EVENT & SIGN UP TO DESIGN A POSTER
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
from 6:30 - 8:30p
Common Market South End
Featuring: $5 organic wine tasting
Join your fellow design community for happy hour,
mingling, tasty libations, and (most importantly)
sign up to receive an AIGA Charlotte Design For Good
Poster Initiative Creative Brief.
Design a poster, relating to the Creative Brief you received
at the Design For Good Poster Initiative Kick-Off Event.
The poster can be a type treatment, illustration,
photograph, collage, watercolor, etc. Posters made non-
digitally must be submitted as scans in the proper format.
Dimensions: 18” x 24” trim size
Color: Monochromatic (one color or shades of one color)
PMS 320 Uncoated (Aqua) for Environmental
PMS 185 Uncoated (Red) for Social Responsibility
Format: Press Ready PDF, under 10 MB, 300ppi
All monochromatic Press Ready PDF posters must be
submitted on or before FRIDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2011
BY 5:00PM to be included in the AIGA Charlotte Design
For Good Poster Initative Gallery Show.
Posters will be displayed on AIGA Charlotte’s online
gallery and be printed for the AIGA Charlotte Design
For Good Poster Iniatative Gallery Exhibit Show
on Friday, November 4, 2011.
Friday, November 4, 2011
from 6:30 - 8:30p
Dialect Design
We tied in the general public by conducting the Gallery
Show Event during a NoDa Gallery Crawl night.
Join your closest friends and colleagues to honor
your hard work for Design for Good and view all
of the submissions.
We’ll be inviting the local nonprofit community where you
can meet the dedicated folks behind these environmental
and socially responsible organizations. And, if you wish,
share your poster with them for a future campaign to help
raise awareness for their cause.
Use hashtag #d4g_posters to share updates, ask questions
and discuss the Design for Good Poster Initiative! Yay!
If you would like to participate in the poster show,
but are unable to attend the AIGA Charlotte
Design For Good Poster Initiative Kick-Off Event,
please email Rachel Martin ([email protected]) to
receive your Creative Brief.
Open to AIGA Charlotte Members, Non-Members,
Students through Professionals, and anyone
who wants to be involved and participate.
Kick-Off Event: 100+ attendees
89 designers signed up to design a poster
52 designers participated and submitted a poster design
Gallery Show Event: 150+ attendees
Numbers were strong for Charlotte, but we would have
liked more participation - a concern from the beginning.
We invited several nonprofit organizations and
policy leaders, some did attend the gallery show, but
we would have liked more - again, an original concern.
It was a challenge to educate designers, nonprofits and the
general public about the value of design and Design For
Good - each individual case was viewed as a success.
We worked hard to facilitate designer and nonprofit
organization relationships - initially concerned if it would
happen, but a few did, and each is considered a success.
We used The Living Principles as the framework for our
AIGA Charlotte Design For Good Poster Initiative, as it
relates to environmental and social responsibility.
Economy, People, Enviornment, Culture.
Economy
Some posters were more successful than others, but they
created awareness for certain nonprofits, which ultimately
helped with fundraising efforts. And...
The Design For Good Poster Initiative also fostered new
relationships with designers and nonprofits that in turn
evolved into some pro-bono and actual paid work.
People
We used the AIGA Charlotte website, many local blogs
and event calendars, along with our Twitter and Facebook
feeds, as our platform for information.
This helped to introduce the general public to local
causes / nonprofits; introduce nonprofits to designers,
and introduce designers to local causes. And...
It also helped create a deeper relationship with designers
to the city they live in, along with inspired Charlotteans to
create positive change and to do service for good!
Environment
The posters themselves were printed by an
environmentally friendly and small family-owned
Charlotte local printer. And...
The Creative Briefs had straight forward Objectives: Keep
it positive, and design a poster to inspire and encourage
environmental awareness and social responsibility.
Culture
This event brought morale and empowerment to
designers, the general public and nonprofits to be doing
more good and taking action. And...
It created excitement for the public, as well as, designers
and nonprofits who worked together for a common goal.
“At the end of your career, are you really going to wish
that you would have designed one more logo?”
A quote from Charlotte’s own Keith Greenstein,
ACD at BooneOakley and recently seen on The Pitch.
We are paraphrasing from an AIGA Charlotte BuzZ
event that Keith spoke at recently, which was about cause
marketing and Design For Good initiatives.
Presented by Kevin Brindley (@KevinBrindley), President
of AIGA Charlotte, for a Breakout Session during the
2012 AIGA Leadership Retreat on May 31, 2012.
Reference Links (In order of presentation):
Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/book/steve-jobs/
id431617578?mt=11
AIGA Design For Good:
http://www.aiga.org/about-design-for-good/
AIGA Design For Good Video:
http://www.aiga.org/video-design-for-good/
Brand Thinking and Other Noble Pursuits
by Debbie Millman:
http://debbiemillman.com/brandthinking/
AIGA Charlotte:
http://www.aigacharlotte.org/
AIGA Charlotte Design For Good Poster Inititative:
http://designforgoodposters.com/
The Living Principles:
http://www.livingprinciples.org/
Keith Greenstein:
http://www.keithgreenstein.com/keith_greenstein/
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