|
First impressions can mean everything. And Jaguar Plano made a memorable one at their Grand Opening event. Guests were met by two women, dressed from head to toe in jaguar print, greeted those entering the newest Park Place dealership. The “Jaguar models” greeted over 200 guests who came for an evening of sleek cars, delectable food, and charitable support for a good cause.
Partial credit for the evening’s success is due to Launch creatives Alex Slotkin and Richard Wezensky, who created a stylish event invitation featuring a stunning profile of a chrome jaguar that “leapt” out of the envelope when opened. Megan Kelly and Alison Hamilton were the account executives on this piece, and Laura Carroll handled print production. 
Launch also worked with editor Travis Coan to create a music video which highlighted the evolution — and growth — of Jaguar as a brand and Park Place as the area’s premier auto dealerships. The video featured classic film of Jaguars dating back to the 1960s, shots of the very first Park Place dealership, and stunning footage of the new Jaguar XJ.
Above: Jason Giles, Megan Kelly, Michael Boone, and Alison Hamilton from Launch, along with Rob Sumner, Director of Marketing for Park Place Dealerships, show support for both the new Jaguar dealership and Children's Medical Center at Legacy, the beneficiary of the evening.
|
Art Director Madison McDaniel rounds out the Launch summer intern team (Copywriter, Account Service, and AD) as her student portfolio and design skills landed her the art director internship. Madison joins us from UNT’s Communication Design program where she also earned this year’s Launch Outstanding Achievement Scholarship for Art Direction. See for yourself how good she is on her portfolio site.
We gave Madison a break from computer layouts just long enough to ask some telling questions:
![Madison 1[5]](http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4071/4700473992_2e6dbdceef.jpg)
Q: Are you an ocean
or lake person?
A: Ocean.
Q: Pen or pencil?
A: Pen.
Q: Favorite video game?
A: Mario Kart.
Q: Which platform?
A: N64.
Q: Favorite color?
A: Black.
When asked what her favorite flower was, Madison couldn’t think of one. (Perhaps this has something to do with her favorite color. After all, we’ve never seen a black flower.)
Q: Are you on Twitter?
A: Yes. @/_sealion.
Q: So you like sea lions?
A: It’s a Fiest song . . .
Q: So you like Fiest?
A: Yes.
Q: What do you want to accomplish at Launch?
A: I’d really like to go on a photo shoot, but I mostly want to immerse myself in the agency environment.
Well, good news for this small town (Brock, Texas), Johnny Cash-loving girl turned art director: she’ll become more immersed in agency life than she ever could have imagined. Welcome aboard, Madison!
Agency News | (0) Comments
|
Caitlin Christopher is a Texan, born and bred. She was a dancer growing up, but now she’s a recent graduate of SMU, from the prestigious Temerlin Advertising Institute, with a major in advertising (and a minor in Spanish).
While in school, Caitlin completed an internship at The Richards Group, focusing in account planning. She also spent a summer studying abroad and visited Mother UK, Naked, Pentagram and Tribal DDB London. With that background, experience and eagerness to continue learning, Caitlin bested many other qualified candidates to earn the coveted Launch internship gig.
Caitlin may be an account service intern, but we tested her creative thinking with a round of Q&A.
Q: Paper or plastic?
A: Paper.
Q: Favorite nail polish color?
A: Fiji – by Essie.
Q: If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go?
A: Greece. I’ve just always wanted to go there.
Q: What’s your favorite website?
A: Does Google Reader count?
Q: What do you want to get out of your internship at Launch?
A: I want to better understand the management side of advertising because my prior internship focused on account planning.
Q: What’s your favorite place in Dallas to get take-out?
A: Green Papaya. It’s like Vietnamese food, on Cedar Springs. Or Eatzi’s. (Eatzi’s, a former Launch client, is on Oak Lawn).
Q: What’s your favorite flower?
A: Stargazer lilies.
Q: What do you do in your free-time?
A: I dance a lot — in the car, sometimes walking down the street. Then I catch myself and realize other people can see me.
When she’s not dancing to a meeting, Caitlin is quietly tapping her feet under her desk.
Welcome to Launch, Caitlin.
Agency News | (0) Comments
|
A new Mercedes-Benz dealership will open soon in Grapevine, Texas. To help Park Place Dealerships tout the groundbreaking, Launch Agency created invitations to the ceremonial event using some groundbreaking printing techniques.
Printed on Cromática lavender paper, the invites have the nostalgic look and feel of architectural blueprints. Art director Reuben Miller and print producer Laura Carroll worked closely with the printer, Colormark, to attain the right effect – first adding a layer of flood metallic blue ink to create the architectural “grid,” then double-bumping the white type to make copywriter Alex Slotkin’s copy pop off the page. The invites were sent in a white mailing tube to current Park Place customers and City of Grapevine VIPs.
Launch also created an online version of the invite using the same theme. To see it for yourself, check out the animated invite.
Despite impending thunderstorms, the May 20 event counted more than 100 guests, including the mayor of Grapevine, the head of the Grapevine Chamber of Commerce and a representative from Mercedes-Benz USA.
Park Place Motorcars Grapevine is expected to open in August of 2011 and will feature a 27,000-square-foot showroom, a service shop with 71 bays, and one of only two Park Place BodyWerks paint and body shops in DFW.
Client News | (0) Comments
|
Randall Kenworthy, recent SMU grad and standout by-product of its Method Creative program, is assisting Launch this summer as our writing intern.
Fresh from a trip to NYC for the One Show Education Festival, he’s looking forward to expanding his portfolio, learning more about the craft of copywriting and the advertising agency business and doing his part to “punk” the other interns as they come join Launch.
Randall’s one of those rare types who knew way back in 9th grade what career path he wanted to pursue. Check back throughout the summer to see how the real ad biz jives with his lifelong expectations. To learn more and check out his stellar student portfolio, visit randallkenworthy.com. You can also follow his exploits on Twitter.
Agency News | (0) Comments
|
The University of North Texas held its 2010 Communication Design Senior Graduation Event in Dallas, on May 14, at the Hayworth Showroom in the Republic Center. Over 200 friends, family members, and faculty came to celebrate the 28 graduating CommDesign seniors.
As part of the celebration, Launch Agency awarded $1,000 scholarships to two students with outstanding junior portfolios in art direction and design. This year, the Outstanding Achievement Scholarship in Design went to Max Barkhatou. The Outstanding Achievement Scholarship for Art Direction went to Madison McDaniel. Congratulations to Madison and Max on their outstanding work!
Launch has awarded scholarships to outstanding UNT junior designers and art directors since 2007. Launch principal/creative director, David Wilgus, himself a UNT graduate, knows first-hand the extraordinary talent in the CommDesign program.
Check out some of Madison’s winning portfolio:
Agency News | (0) Comments
|
The Children’s Advocacy Center of Collin County held its annual fundraiser at the Hilton Anatole, Dallas, and Launchers Alison Hamilton, Reuben Miller, and Diane Seimetz were on hand. Reuben designed the Center’s new brand identity earlier this year, and along with Diane and Alison, helped create the on-stage presentation “Impact Moment,” which depicted the struggles of abused children, and the relief the Center provides.
The gala’s theme this year was “Rock On!” and that it did. The band, World Classic Rockers, was the featured entertainment, consisting of former members from Santana, Journey, Boston, Steppenwolf, Toto, and Lynyrd Skynyrd. In addition to the entertainment, both live and silent auctions were held with all proceeds going to the Children’s Advocacy Center.
The event was chaired by local philanthropist Carolyn Speese—wife of Advocacy Center Board President, and Rent-A-Center CEO, Mark Speese (a long-time Launch client). A key sponsor of the event was Launch client Park Place Lexus, which generously donated several Lexus vehicles to the raffle.
Client News | (0) Comments
|
Launch Agency is pleased to welcome its newest addition to the squad — Linda Powell. She’s our Director of First Impressions, receptionist and office den mother. To find out what’s really behind her wonderful smile, we ran her through a little Q & A.
Q: Where’s your hometown?
A: Moyers, Oklahoma, a pleasant town in the southeastern part of the state near the Kiamichi Mountains.
Q: How long you been a Texan?
A: 42 years!
Q: Favorite vacation spot?
A: None other than the home of mariachi and all-inclusives. Cancun, Mexico.
Q: Favorite movie you’ve seen recently?
A: It’s Complicated, with Meryl Streep, Steve Martin, and Alec Baldwin.
Q: Secret snack food preference?
A: I gotta stick with the whole-baked goodness of Goldfish. I just can’t get enough of those little things!
Q: Top celebrity crush?
A: Patrick Swayze by a long shot. Have you seen Dirty Dancing? Enough said.
How’s that for a first impression? Just wait until you meet her in person. Needless to say, Launch is glad to have her onboard.
|
In honor of Launch Agency’s 7th birthday, the whole team went to Steve Fields (one of the finest restaurants in Plano, and Dallas, for that matter) to celebrate. Nothing like some cocktails, jumbo shrimp, prime steaks, and chocolate cake to hail seven years in business and seven years of consecutive growth.
Employees didn’t drop a dime, but we did have to “sing for our supper.” That is, each person had to create an award and give it to a co-worker. Some awards were serious, some sentimental and some crazy funny. Some even came with trophies, visual aids and a poem. Not a bad deal for a gourmet meal.
Here are just a couple of the awards:
Reuben was given a golden Mexican bean, hand carved from a single block of wood. It honors his bean-styling skills displayed at a recent photo shoot. Very touching, indeed…
Ashley received a can of spinach for having the “best laugh that sounds a little like Popeye.” She was also given a miniature punching bag featuring the faces of two of her favorite co-workers (Jason and Richard).
Principal and Account Director Michael Boone summed it up best, “This is such a fast-paced business; everyone at Launch works very hard and stays constantly busy. It’s a lot of fun to take a night to celebrate our successes and spend time with one another as friends – not simply as friendly coworkers on tight deadlines.”
Launch’s b-day is March 1st (don’t forget to drop us a card or email next year).
Agency News, Our Culture | (0) Comments
|
smart USA named Launch agency of record for their business-to-business advertising. This was the result of hard — and creative — work and entrepreneurial thinking for our longtime client, Park Place Dealerships.
It all started with our award-winning out-of-home and TV campaign for smart center Dallas & smart center Fort Worth. After those initiatives, Launch created a corporate fleet program for the two smart centers to further generate traffic and spur new car sales. This program drew the interest of the smart USA headquarters, which requested Launch develop a national program for the brand.
Alex Slotkin and Diane Seimetz crafted the witty, err “smart,” headlines; Richard Wezensky and Brent Richison developed the clean, tasteful designs.
Here’s a peek at some of the smart work thus far:
If you’d like to see more of our work, or to take a test drive, just stop by a smart center near you.
Agency News, Client News | (0) Comments
