Everytown for Gun Safety
Creating a brand and strategy to end America’s gun violence epidemic
We helped Everytown for Gun Safety develop its founding brand and strategy to mobilize everyday Americans around commonsense policies to decrease gun violence.
Challenge
Gun violence is a pervasive problem in the United States, and many Americans don’t feel they have the power to stop it. In the wake of the Newtown tragedy, Americans needed a new approach to address gun violence, one that would bring together people from all sides to change the conversation and influence policy. Mayors Against Illegal Guns tasked us with mobilizing everyday Americans around commonsense policies to decrease gun violence.
Strategy
Our strategy was to highlight the power of everyday Americans by producing content that compelled people anywhere in the country to take action for gun safety and helping elevate the voices of people who are most affected by gun violence. Powered by burgeoning membership, this new brand could bring important, but often neglected, gun safety issues to the forefront, like domestic violence and unintentional gun deaths.
Creative
We viewed this branding through the lens of participation, aiming to create a name and identity that made people feel connected to the issue and gave them agency. We wanted to focus on bringing together people across the country, no matter where they were from or their political affiliation. The creative needed to feel American — strong and supportive. And it worked: the New York Observer called our launch video “possibly the most harrowing and effective interactive video ever made on a political issue.”
Campaign
The brand narrative, organizing strategy, launch website, video and launch campaign all helped to make gun violence feel real and immediate. Through shareable social media graphics we highlighted the gun violence crisis in the US and invited everyday people to commit to ending it. With an interactive website we consolidated resources, events and tools to help people get involved, while engaging communities that typically hadn’t had gun-safety conversations.
Impact
Our branding and strategy helped bring together over a million moms, dads, teachers, police officers and politicians to speak up, speak out and make real policy change. One campaign helped pass the first-ever ballot initiative for universal background checks in Washington state; others successfully prohibited the open-carrying of firearms in public places. Everytown for Gun Safety is now the United States’ largest gun violence prevention organization. (And Fast Company gave us an Innovation By Design Award.)
Results also included:
Kicked off a $50M/year gun violence movement
2M views of the launch video within 48 hours
1.5M postcards sent to elected officials nationwide through the “Not One More” campaign