Team Wins Second Place in National Advertising Competition

From: Jen Brotman, president

Phone: 908.723.3842
E-mail: TheNewHouseAgency@gmail.com

Date: May 13, 2011

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The NewHouse Agency takes second in American Petroleum Institute competition 

Syracuse, NY – This week, members of The NewHouse, the student-run advertising agency of the Newhouse school, won second place in Energy Tomorrow: America’s Challenge. The team presented an integrated marketing campaign to energy industry executives in San Francisco, California on May 12.

Syracuse University was one of three schools represented in the national finals for the competition, which was organized by EdVenture Partners. The challenge was to create an advertising campaign to educate college-age students on national energy issues, and was sponsored by the American Petroleum Institute. The winning school was from the University of New Mexico, and the third place team was from Ball State University.

The team was led by junior advertising major Evan Davis (Longmeadow, MA), and consisted of junior advertising majors Steve Prosonic (Camillus, NY) and Dave Biles (Penfield, NY) and sophomore advertising majors Allyssa Kaiser (Zimmerman, MN) and Rodney Fleming (Parsons, KS).

The strategy behind the campaign was to “promote energy with energy” by developing a series of energy drinks called Joule that would subtly double as educational tools about energy issues.

“We knew we wanted a really big, bold idea. And an incredibly well-targeted idea. So we turned to the best resource of all: our peers. We gained some great insight into our target and went from there,” Davis said. 

The proposed campaign was designed to promote the drink, and not the energy issues themselves. It centered around an energy drink with six flavors: crude, natural gas, coal, solar, nuclear and wind. The drink can would serve as a vehicle for delivering key facts and statistics. Another key component was vending machines, placed on college campuses across the nation, to distribute the drinks.

The team was accompanied to San Francisco by Professor Brian Sheehan.

“Joule is surprising in its impact: it has the earmarks of an idea that could actually succeed in the market, potentially on a gigantic scale. Their presentation was also stellar.  They were exciting to watch and presented their work with the flair of seasoned professionals. I was just happy to be associated with their success,” Sheehan said.

This is the fourth time The NewHouse has placed in a national competition in the last 2 years. The agency won the GM+U Marketing challenge in December 2009 and the Honda CR-Z Media Challenge in December 2010, both sponsored by EdVenture Partners.

For more information about The NewHouse or this campaign, contact Jen Brotman, agency president, at (908)-723-3842, TheNewHouseAgency@gmail.com.

###