Found: Greatest. Interns. Ever.

July 23rd, 2012

It’s true. Our search for “The Greatest Interns Ever” has come to an end. Several hopefuls heard the call but only two made the cut. These brave souls decided to take the plunge and join the creative crew at ELEVATE. This summer, we’d like to welcome and introduce Andrew Bromwell and Kendall Hendricks.

Kendall, our softball slingin’, long boarding intern, is a recent graduate of The Ohio State University, and holds a degree in Visual Communication Design. Her high school sweetheart – typography, led her to pursue a career in design. With a diverse design portfolio coupled with awesome longboarding skills, she scored a coveted spot as an ELEVATE intern.

Andrew, also a recent graduate of The Ohio State University, holds a degree in Visual Communication Design. This bass playing, Star Wars lovin’, intern’s obsession with gig posters compelled him to seek a living through design. Andrew’s vast Star Wars collection (500 items) was the main reason we selected him as an intern. Just kidding, it was his whacky portfolio and determination that secured his spot.

Follow our interns as we send them through an “ELEVATE Summer Camp” – which may be more like a boot camp. Over the next three months, these two will be honing their design skills, building their portfolio and learning key studio skillz, like baking cookies. For each task they complete, they will receive a badge to add to their summer camp portfolio. Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter to suggest additional tasks for them to complete. We welcome your brilliance.

Here’s a photo of the first badge our interns received:

The Press Check.

MONKEY MAD LIB UPDATE

July 15th, 2011

THANK YOU to everyone who participated in our Monkey Mad Lib. Sounds like Sock Monkey enjoyed his vacation despite everything you guys put him through! As promised, here’s the completed story:

While visiting the beach, Sock Monkey knew how (SNOTTY) the sun was and covered his (NAUGHTY) body with (MAKERS MARK) for protection. He then (ELEVATED) into the water to cool off and (CLAPPED) in the waves.

After (52) hours, Sock Monkey got out to dry off with a (DOG) and quickly noticed everyone on shore (SNIFFING) him. Confused, he looked around and suddenly realized his fur had turned into (PURPLE POLKA DOTS)!

(HAPPY), Sock Monkey ran to the (BATHTUB) to fix his appearance.

However, upon looking in the mirror, Sock Monkey was actually (EXCITED) with his style and (HAPPILY) (FARTED) back to the beach. He (PLAYED) the critics and enjoyed the rest of his day with his new look!

We’ve Gone Mad – Mad Libs, That Is

July 8th, 2011

We have a special love for classic, vintage games and toys and found it more than appropriate to create our own Mad Lib in honor of Leonard Stern and Roger Price (Who?! – keep reading). Our interns, Laura and Emily, put together this AWESOME Mad Lib and we need your help. Yes, YOU!

Starting next week, each day we will tweet and post the kinds of words we need to complete our Mad Lib. This is where you come in. YOU (<- See?) respond with CLEAN coordinating words you’d like to see in the blanks. We’ll then randomly choose a word from everyone’s responses to complete our story. On Friday, we’ll reveal the entire crazy funny story that YOU helped create.

Seriously. We know how you all are. Please keep your responses clean.

HOW IT ALL BEGAN:

As a writer for several television shows in the 1950’s, Leonard Stern was struggling to come up with an adjective to describe a character on the show, The Honeymooners. At the most (in)appropriate time, Roger Price, a humor writer, walked by. Stern asked Price for a few adjectives and before Stern could tell him what he was describing, Price blurted out, “clumsy, naked!” and the two immediately burst into laughter.

Dying to know what Stern was describing?? Stern needed a description for a nose – more specifically – the nose of Ralph Kramden’s boss.

Together, the witty writers created Mad Libs, a game in which players are asked to fill in blanks with certain parts of speech (nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc.) to transform a somewhat normal story into a seriously hilarious turn of events. The pair first introduced the game on “The Steve Allen Show” after Stern convinced host, Steve Allen to introduce comedian, Bob Hope by using Mad Libs given by audience members. Hope was introduced as follows, “And here’s the scintillating Bob Hope, whose theme song is, ‘Thanks for the Communist’.” Audience members were absolutely tickled, they loved being involved in the show and in on some of the jokes.

Because no one thought this game would take off, Stern and Price published 14,000 copies of Mad Libs themselves. Since 1958 there have been over 120 volumes of Mad Libs and more than 150 million copies have been sold. Since 2008, more than 2 million Mad Lib apps have been downloaded to the world’s greatest technologies: smart phones and iPads. (Take that all you publishers who turned them down!) It’s pretty safe to say, a LOT of people love this game.

2011 = Even Gianter

February 24th, 2011

2010 was a giant year for ELEVATE. But we have plenty of reasons to expect 2011 to be even gianter (yes: we said “gianter.”)

First off, we’re pleased to announce the addition of American Signature Inc. to our client family. Second and third off, we’ve pulled Andy Fisher and Bryan Mulvany into our talent pool.

Back to American Signature Inc. You may know they’re a leading home furniture provider headquartered right here in Columbus. Well, they’ve officially picked ELEVATE thinking to assist with their outreach and communication efforts in 2011. This cool new partnership includes public relations execution, new product promotion and community outreach projects. With unique furniture lines such as HomeCourt by Lebron James and the Miss America collection, American Signature Inc. will be a perfect fit here at ELEVATE.

As for those two handsome new faces you’ll see should you get the chance to stop in and join us for an afternoon of creative brainstorming…

For starters, there’s designer Andy Fisher. He’s a graduate of CCAD and a self-proclaimed Columbus townie. He loves snowboarding and the smell of carburetor cleaner. Don’t let his curious tastes and quiet confidence fool you. Behind those chic glasses and easy smile lies a badass digital packrat ready to let loose his razor-sharp design skills on the rest of our creative team…and the world!

Follow him on twitter, if you dare. @wiiildstyle

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And then there’s Bryan Mulvany. A graduate of Ohio Northern University in Ada, Ohio, Mulvany’s inner struggle to acclimate himself to big city life is often entertaining. His purple lunchbox and disdain for wearing shoes and undershirts make him the subject of steady criticism. But with his lack of uptown etiquette come serious task managing skills that will serve our account team well.

Tag along on Twitter. We promise he won’t bite. Much. @bryanmulvany

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To make room these shining faces and all the new work they’ll be crushing, we just put the finishing touches on our expanded new studio space. After Troy had his fun literally knocking down a wall or two, we added four new work stations, an executive office, a private conference room and two collaborative work spaces. True, this afforded us some much-needed breathing space. But more important, it gave us more room for the claw game (yes: that’s an iPhone in there), the Ms. Pacman/Galaga machine, the Elevate moped and other vital pieces of office machinery.

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There’s always something new and exciting taking place here at ELEVATE thinking, and you’re always invited to call us up and beg permission to stop on by and check it out. Seriously: we look forward to showing you our space, our people, and most of all, the outstanding work we’ve been providing our clients.

But enter at your own risk. You just might stumble into a Nerf gun battle. And, in Nerf, as it is in the branding process, our team has been full granted permission to fire at will.

Not following us? Do so on Twitter. Like us but haven’t “Liked” us yet? Click your bad self over to Facebook.

Mike makes right.

June 7th, 2010

What started as a hunt for the most perfect, brilliant writer ever ended with ELEVATE bagging 183 pounds of free-ranging advertising man-monkey commonly known as Mike Rehfus.

Native to the wilds of Detroit, but well-acclimated to Columbus, Mike brings fierce brand, retail, promo and b2b chops to the crew along with vast experience with clients the likes of Coke, Blockbuster, UPS Store, Canadian Tire, Chase Bank, Eli Lilly and your Columbus Crew (to name a scant few).

Add to that a background in design and mix in hours (and hours) of stories from his former lives as a touring musician and owner of a coffeehouse, and it’s clear: Mike’s one of the most dangerous writers in Columbus and we’re damn proud to have him.

Give the man-monkey a follow on twitter @mike_rehfus – if you dare.

Now enjoy a little taste of the gun show!

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CALLING ALL WRITERS. WELL MAYBE JUST THE MOST PERFECT, BRILLIANT ONE EVER – OTHER THAN DARREN.

April 15th, 2010

Long story short: ELEVATE is growing and we need another brilliant writer who can keep up with Darren (good luck with that). Someone who can think on their feet, generate great ideas and make concepts real – sometimes with a deadline looming closer than you’d like. I won’t lie, it’s not an easy job. But you will be surrounded by a great group of people helping you do it – while having a blast.

So take a look around our site. If you think that you and your writing talent would be a good fit… then why haven’t we heard from you yet?

Send your resume and samples to writer@elevatethining.com.

What are you waiting for? Go! Go! Go!

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ANOTHER PIECE OF THE PUZZLE – FINALLY IN ITS PROPER PLACE

March 5th, 2010

This is a post I’ve wanted to write for more than a year. When I finally could, client meetings, workload – the usual stuff – pushed it back a couple more weeks. After all the delays, I’m excited to say that Heidi Kahrl has joined us as the studio director at ELEVATE.

I could talk all day about her talent and experience. Blah blah blah. But what’s really important is how rare it is to find people who “get it.” Heidi is one of those people. She’s in perfect alignment with ELEVATE’s philosophy, has an unbelievable work ethic and is dependable to a fault.

I worked with Heidi for several years prior to forming ELEVATE and I consider her a good friend that I hold in high regard. I know her ability to plan, organize and flat out get things done is going to be a benefit to our crew and clients. Add that to her personality, and she fits right in with the way we work.

Heidi will be challenged with keeping me on task (good luck), enabling Kim and her account team to focus on client relations, helping Darren prioritize and chasing Jared among many other things. It’s more than a full-time job, but she just has this way of making it look easy.

Get to know Heidi, learn about her upcoming wedding to the “stud” known as Ed and what’s happening with her house hunting explorations by giving her a follow on twitter @HK02.

Welcome Heidi.

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Capital Health Chooses ELEVATE thinking

November 11th, 2009

We are excited to announce that Capital Health, a family owned and operated home health, nursing, assisted and independent living facility management company with 15 facilities, selected ELEVATE thinking to launch the branding and marketing campaign supporting their new cancer recovery centers. The partnership includes strategy, brand implementation, advertising, media buying, public relations support, marketing and communication support.

The Capital Health philosophy is to care for patients as they would their own family; and with that in mind, they are launching the first cancer recovery centers in the Midwest. The Centers will be located at the Capital Health facilities of the Oaks of West Kettering and the Carriage Inn of Steubenville.

The Cancer Recovery Centers are very forward thinking in their offering and we’re proud to support their care initiatives with brand development, marketing strategy and community and media outreach. This is an exciting relationship for us and marks the beginning of a long-term relationship.

The Cancer Recovery Centers are unique, state-of-the-art facilities at which cancer patients can recover and receive multidisciplinary care. The specially trained staff includes physical therapists, specialty nurses, occupational therapists, speech therapists, dieticians and counselors. The Centers put the patient first with available treatments such as aquatic therapy, nutrition programming, calorimetry therapy, symptom and pain management and other beneficial programs. The Cancer Recovery Center at the Carriage Inn of Steubenville opened Oct. 15 and the Cancer Recovery Center at the Oaks of West Kettering opened Oct. 21.

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From Opera to Adena

October 14th, 2009

We’ve been going a hundred different directions lately, which is all good. Except there’s one thing that’s been on the top of my list that I just haven’t been able to get to — the introduction of Lisa Minken, our newest account director. She’s smart, talented and she can sing. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Lisa joins us from Opera Columbus where she served as director of marketing and public relations. But it’s more than her experience that brought her here. Once again, it’s all about relationships at ELEVATE. I’ve known Lisa for nearly ten years and I’m excited to work with her. Her personality, attitude and dedication fits right in with the rest of us.

Of course, her talents and skills are also a great fit. Her background includes work in healthcare, apparel, durable goods and propane industries, as well as profit, nonprofit and agency work. This is someone who knows how to provide amazing work in campaign development and implementation, event planning, community engagement and more.

Which is going to come in handy as she provides ELEVATE with stellar internal communication and project support on-the-ground at Adena. Well, not actually on-the-ground… We got her a chair on her third day. Along with adding another level of organization and account management to the group, we’re also proud that she’ll continue to support Opera Columbus while at ELEVATE.

Learn more about Lisa and ask her to sing you a song @LisaMinken

and her headshot is glamorous