Martino Flynn has had a long standing relationship with the Breast Cancer Coalition of Rochester (BCCR), supporting its efforts at the annual ARTrageous Affair as a Gold Sponsor.
For the 10th anniversary of the ARTragous Affair in 2011, the team at Martino Flynn turned its focus onto the controversial issue of national versus local breast cancer research donations and support. Martino Flynn and BCCR wanted to challenge ARTrageous Affair attendees to keep their donations within the Rochester community, instead of supporting the “big business” of pink ribbon products.
Through the research and planning stages for the campaign, Martino Flynn found that breast cancer awareness has become a popular cause for brands to support. All too often, the pink ribbon is used by big businesses to generate profit by encouraging consumers to shop for a cure—therefore, taking advantage of the public’s desire to “do good.”
Martino Flynn set out to create an ad that graphically conveyed the message that sometimes, pink ribbon products do more for big business than they do for breast cancer research. The resulting graphic depicted a dollar bill shaped like a pink ribbon. Attention was called to the BCCR’s impact on the Rochester community, and the call to action for attendees was to donate to the BCCR.
BCCR executives weren’t the only individuals who thought that the ad was a success— judges for the 2012 PRism Awards were also impressed. “Pink Responsibly” won an Award of Excellence from the PRSA Rochester Chapter in the “Other Print Piece,” not-for-profit category.
