Every so often, we have projects where an envelope needs to be designed to match a letterhead or an invitation. Other parts of a design project can be free from rules and regulations, but the design space on an envelope is much more rigid. The Post Office is very particular about the layout of envelopes due to machines doing most of the processing and sorting these days. There are certain areas on an envelope that needs to be clear of background color, graphics and type. This can be a real challenge for a designer.

The envelope is the first piece that is seen and needs to compel a person to open it, yet space is so limited to convey a message other than a logo and return address. The San Diego Museum of Art Art Alive invitation envelope is a great example of keeping the branded look and feel of this years’ Art Alive, yet still meeting postal regulations. The pink area indicates the space that is off-limits for type and design.

For information and templates on envelopes, go to USPS.com. You can also find the Mailpiece Design Analyst contact information where you can send an envelope design to see if it meets mailing regulations. Do this before the job is printed and rejected by the post office. It will save you lots of time and money.

Are you familiar with The San Diego Museum of Art?  We work with them on advertising and PR and fortunately for me, I get to work with them on a ton of cool stuff.  Many people have no idea how much activity takes place at the Museum so I wanted to take this opportunity to spotlight a really cool event they throw every other month, Culture & Cocktails.  At this event last Thursday, I interviewed the artist behind one of the exciting new exhibitions, Brutal Beauty:  Drawings by Hugo Crosthwaite. Check out the video to hear Hugo’s own vision for the drawing he’s working on at the Museum until March 14th.  You can also see a really cool time lapse video on his current drawing here, but make sure you check out the exhibition for yourself.

The creativity train never stops at Bailey Gardiner, even when it has absolutely nothing to do with our present or future clients. It’s not like a faucet you can just turn off. So the other day when a bunch of us were ripping on the hideous ice skating outfits at the Vancouver Olympic Games, we started laughing about our stylish PR gals and their teetering 6-inch stiletto heels.  I think it was @lizzied that suggested we host our own Bailey Gardiner Olympics, and a silly idea was born.  The creatives took it from there, and the results are pretty hysterical:

Congrats to our gold medalist Katy Harrison, who I think could climb a ladder in her Mahnolos while sipping a Starbucks Fat-Free Latte, collating a client metrics spreadsheet and tweeting from her cell phone with a reporter from @nytimes. Rock on.

What is your hidden talent?  Nominate yourself to be included in our next BG Olympics video  — send us your concept, and you could win valuable prizes and widespread notoriety.  Plus a pat on the back.

We are served advertising continuously in so many forms. But whether advertising gets our attention or not can depend on an undervalued element: white space. This is the areas between type and images in a magazine ad or web page, etc., that is blank.  And when it is used well, white space can automatically increase the design aesthetic.

White space provides a balance in the design, a place for the eyes to rest, and accentuates the product and messaging in the layout.

This VW campaign was launched in 1959 by ad agency Doyle Dane Bernbach and uses white space brilliantly. Some advertisers want to fill every square inch of purchased space with type and graphics because they have the inaccurate idea they are getting the most bang for their buck. Trying to wedge too much content into a layout can lead to advertising that gets little or no attention, basically a waste of ad dollars, since building brand awareness and moving people to buy products is the goal in advertising.

We’ve seen that it takes creativity and courage to say yes to white space but that it can pay off. Sometimes less is more.

Last February, two unemployed brothers from Illinois made an amateur Doritos TV commercial and scored the top spot in USA Today’s Super Bowl 2009 Ad Meter.

Last Sunday, as the culmination of their Crash the Super Bowl contest, Doritos aired four more consumer-generated spots. “Casket”, which features a man pretending to be dead so that he could be buried with a casket full of chips. “House Rules”, where a little boy puts the smack down on his mother’s date. “Snack Attack Samurai”, that shows what happens when you steal a bag from a Doritos’ fanatic. And “Underdog”, the spot below, where a dog has its proverbial day at the expense of a man who refuses to share his bounty.

After the results of this year’s Super Bowl Ad Meter were tallied, the Betty White Snickers spot came in first. “Underdog” second. However, Joshua Svoboda, was awarded a $600,000 prize for his efforts (per contest rules). Not bad considering his commercial only took $200 to make.

Predictably, articles were written saying that ad agencies should be afraid. There were those who suggested that the everyday Joe (or Jane) with a camcorder, computer and idea could produce a TV spot that’s just as effective as one made by the traditional Madison Avenue agency. Along with that argument is that brands would be able to save marketing dollars if they choose to run with amateur productions.

But here’s the truth about consumer-generated ads- those amateurs aren’t always amateurs. Turns out Joshua is actually a creative director of sorts. And in an article looking back at past winners of consumer-generated advertising contests, it appears that a fair number have ties to the industry. Apparently, creative professionals are consumers too. (Heck, two of us here at B.G. put together a :12 TV spot for Mountain Dew.)

A few years ago, the New York Times reported that free ads still come with a high price tag. Agencies and brand marketers spend months planning their consumer-generated contests- hiring lawyers to vet them and designing advertisements to promote them. People then have to spend countless hours wading through entries.

Whether or not they are truly effective may still be up for debate. But one thing that can be said in favor of consumer-generated ads is that agencies and brands get sent a ton of new ideas. And as long as those ideas may potentially be made real, we’ll keep our camcorders ready… and the idea fountain flowing.

*This post is part of Bailey Gardiner’s Public Relations Tactics series, which highlights tools and best practices to ensure a successful public relations campaign. The series will run weekly.

If you work for a public relations firm, why wouldn’t you do your own PR and practice what you preach?

A while back, Jennifer from our advertising team blogged about Bailey Gardiner’s ad in USA Today. But like she mentioned in her post, advertising is only part of the strategy in branding yourself and working with the types of clients you want to represent. Creating an integrated strategy by adding public relations and social media to the mix is like the one-two punch. Ready? And go.

Here are just a few ways to PR your agency’s work:

Share Agency News

You’re proud of the work you do, right? Announce new hires and share your agency wins with PR trades like PRWeek and Bulldog Reporter as well as local business publications and online. PitchEngine is great service that makes it easy to create a social media news release and your own social media newsroom.

Utilize Social Media Platforms

Whether it’s creating mobile video or doing industry-specific public relations,  showcase your agency’s brilliant thinking on platforms like LinkedIn and Facebook, or make it easy for people to find you with a Twitter handle or Twitter hashtag.

Position Key Staff as Experts

Another way you can use PR to promote your agency. Pitch senior staff as experts available for interview and for speaking opportunities.

To a lot of people, paper is just that, paper. But, when you work in an industry that involves printing a wide range of items for your clients, (think letterhead, save-the-date cards, pamphlets, and other such collateral) you quickly learn there are thousands of different types of paper. Out of these thousands of types, there are quite a few options for those who want to print on eco-friendly paper and with companies becoming more and more environmentally conscious, we propose at least one eco-friendly paper option to all of our clients.

Below are the types of “green” paper that we use most often:

1) Recycled Paper: Many brands have “recycled paper” options but the vast majority is not 100% recycled. Usually a portion of it is. This is a good option for companies who are environmentally conscientious, but may not have the budget to print on a 100% recycled paper.

2) FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) Certified Paper: This paper has come from trees that were grown in an area where funds have gone to to eliminate habitat destruction, water pollution and violence against people and wildlife. Sometimes you are able to find a FSC paper that has also, been recycled – a doubly green choice.

3) Post-Consumer Material (PCW) Paper: This paper has been used and then separated from solid waste to be recycled into new paper. This paper is made from all types of products, therefore re-using even more waste than a recycled paper uses.

4) Seed Paper - The coolest new trend is that people are starting to print on seed paper which is a type of paper that is embedded with an array of wildflower seeds. You can actually take this paper, plant it and grow flowers. And the best part is this paper isn’t even made out of trees. We often go to Green Field Paper in San Diego where they specialize in 100 percent tree-free products. They make their paper out of recycled uniforms from Seaworld, mixed with 100 percent organic cotton and an array of other ingredients that would have been thrown out in the trash. I think this is my new favorite type of paper. Such a cool concept!

Everyone is used to Powerpoint, but Keynote is PPT on steroids. Of course, it is made by Apple! It is user-friendly and there are endless options for creative presentations, but many aren’t using it yet because they don’t want to have to learn a new program. Here at Bailey Gardiner, we use Keynote for every client presentation so we’ve put together a few pointers to make using Keynote a little easier. 

• Add a Slide

• Select “Slide”
• Select “New Slide”
• From the Masters drop down in the toolbar, select the master slide you would like your new slide to be

• Add A Picture

• Drag a file into your keynote OR
• Go to “Insert” and “Choose” and you can browse for the image to insert

• Frame a Picture

• Select the “i” inspector icon
• From the inspector menu, select the image tab
• With your image selected, from the “Stroke” dropdown, select frame

• Sizing an Image

• Select the image
• Use the squares on the corners and edges of the image to drag in or out
• To size proportionally, drag a corner of the image while holding “Shift”

• Cropping or “Masking” an Image

• Select the image to Mask
• Select the “Mask” icon in the toolbar
• Drag the crop marks or use the sliding bar in the edit mask box to the desired crop
• Click anywhere else in the slide to accept

• Multiple Images

• When using multiple images on one slide, Keynote will show yellow lines from image to image to help you center all of them
• If images overlap, you can bring an image to the top of another by selecting it and choosing “Arrange” and “Bring to Front.” The same applies to back, etc.

• Embed Video

• Drag the video into your keynote
• Size as needed
• It will play when you turn to that slide in presentation mode

• Embedding a Link

• Select the text or image that you want to link to a website (note: during the presentation, you must be connected to the internet for it to work)
• Select the hyperlink tab from the inspector box
• Check “Enable as a hyperlink”
• Select “Webpage” from the Link To dropdown
• Type the URL you want to link to

• Creating Presentation Notes

• Select “View” in the menu and select “Show Presenter Notes”
• Add notes where shown.

• Presenting

• Select the Play button in the toolbar to begin a presentation.
• Click your mouse, press space bar or use arrow keys to advance the presentation
• If you are connected to a larger screen or projector, select Play from toolbar and select Customize Presenter Display. Check the following: Current Slide, Next Slide, Notes, Clock

While companies around the country are learning how to engage in social media, we really appreciate the ones that can have fun with the fact that they may not know everything about it.  And Big Bear Mountain Resort’s new radio spot illustrates this perfectly.  Not to mention, this spot really is AWESOME-SAUCE!

(click the link below to hear radio spot)

BBMRRadioSpot

We are entering our fifth year of working with Seaport Village, a favorite seaside destination for San Diego locals and visitors, and Bailey Gardiner is lucky to manage all of Seaport’s marketing efforts – public relations, advertising, special events and social media.

In preparation for a presentation to the tenants of Seaport, we wanted to compile a highlight reel of all the great work that went on throughout 2009. It’s a fun way to bring to life the advertisements, collateral pieces, events, public relations hits, social media, and onsite signage the Bailey Gardiner teams created. And it’s definitely more entertaining than me standing at the front of the room rattling them all off! So we gathered all the necessary pieces and enlisted Rich, our fantastic copywriter and jack of many trades, to put together our video (some of you may recall his great work on the BG Holiday Video and outtakes). Our client and the tenants enjoyed it and we hope you do to.