Like the clients we serve, Paperkite sprang from a vision to create a quadruple-bottom-line creative communications agency, adding genuine value to our clients, our creative team members’ lives, our communities and our financial sustainability.
To that last end, we welcomed this week a new member of our team, Angelica Goss-Bley, whose personal business philosophy dovetails perfectly with Paperkite’s.
Angelica is your typical Ivy League alumna who graduated with a double major in statistics and musical composition. She holds a master’s degree in experimental performance and social justice, and she runs her own accounting firm that specializes in helping locally owned businesses and farms build and maintain sustainable financial practices.
We’re thrilled that Angelica will bring to Paperkite both a keen mind for our own financial sustainability and growth, but also a singular ability to identify statistical strengths and weaknesses for our clients.
In the future, we hope Angelica will share her insights on financial sustainability here on the Paperkite site.
Welcome, Angelica. We can’t wait to see what’s ahead.
I’m not a big fan of fast food. I don’t eat meat, so that means most fast food chains hold little appeal in the first place. On those rare occasions when I find myself hungry, on the road, without food and without time or inclination to go to a real restaurant, I’ll make a run for the border and hit Taco Bell.
It’s not exactly enjoyable or satisfying, but it is serviceable. One step up from astronaut food or a nutrition pill. Or maybe it’s a step down.
Regardless, that’s all I expect of it. If the kitchen crew screws up my order, that’s kind of par for the course. If it’s cold or the tortilla is a little stale? Meh.
I think it goes beyond food and beyond my own industry. I think you can apply the fast food v. home cooking analogy to almost any service or business or organization.
And you can tell which kind of food you’re dealing with by looking at the cooks’ intentions.
Are they trying to nourish you and make you stronger? Do they care what your favorite foods are? Are they interested in the quality and skill that goes into each dish?
Or are they punching a clock and collecting a check?
Brand Republic reports that, despite their frequent use of social media outlets online, most women say that those sites don’t influence their shoe buying decisions.
What? Clearly these women did not get the memo from the marketing community that these media were to be used for commercial purposes. Log in to Facebook, open your wallet and smile.
You can also chat with your friends and share photos, but only if you must.
I think there are two good lessons to think about here.
1. Social media doesn’t make women want to buy shoes. Shoes make women want to buy shoes.
If women aren’t buying your shoes, maybe you should make better shoes. Maybe you should find a way to ask them what a better shoe would look like.
2. Wouldn’t it be awesome if there were some kind of technology that would even allow you to invite shoe design ideas and connect to women all over the world who love shoes?
I stumbled across this excellent presentation on the difference between using social media tools and developing a social media strategy.
Too often, people in business and non-profits jump into the tools because someone on their board said they should be on FacebookTwitterYouTubeFlickr. Or someone read int he New York Times that social media is the way to go.
Anyone can integrate the tools, but without a clear strategy – including goals and measures of success – most of those folks end up using these mew media to do the same old (ineffective or downright annoying) push marketing. That’s the worst thing you can do in this space.
In the column, author Virginia Heffernan rings Facebook’s death knell by recounting a handful of anecdotes (most from friends of hers) about people who have grown disenchanted, bored or just fed-up with Facebook and stopped spending time there.
The only problem is that, as she writes herself, “the exodus is not evident from the site’s overall numbers. According to comScore, Facebook attracted 87.7 million unique visitors in the United States in July.”
It’s hard to characterize something as an “exodus” when the only evidence of it is anecdotal stories from a few friends. It’s like watching the chicken cross the road and calling is a mass migration.
Here’s another anecdote:
Lo those many years ago when I was a reporter, I once had an executive editor who believed that his own personal experience reflected every major trend in the community. If he happened to notice that there were two new Chinese restaurants in town, within a week the paper would run a front-page story about “Area Becomes Hub of Chinese Cuisine.”
If he attended a suburban barbecue and saw two women wearing Keds, our Life section soon heralded, “Keds: Haute Staple of the Suburban MILF.” (w/o the MILF part, of course, but that was the subtext.)
Everything was a trend. And because the paper covered everything as a trend, it quickly lost every last bit of credibility it had to identify real trends. And like newspapers across the country, it experienced an exodus of readers and advertisers.
We’re big fans of all of our traditional cultural attractions. Susan and I even serve on a committee at the Fenimore and Farmers’ Museums to increase appeal to young professionals, which we joined because the committee meets in places like Brewery Ommegang (disclosure).
So there has always been something going on here. Even in the bitter, snow-drift-covered winter months, there’s usually something to do if you look hard enough.
But in the past six months, there are suddenly so MANY things to do it’s hard to keep up.
The Smithy-Pioneer Gallery is proving that you can bring some seriously new culture to a town’s oldest building (here’s their website and their Facebook page, which is more active).
The “Fen & Farm” (short for Fenimore and Farmers’) has continued hosting some wonderful cultural events, such as the Cooperstown Chamber Music Festival, as well as a stunning season of exhibits at the art museum, including Walker Evans photography and “America’s Rome.” They’ve also added weeklong immersive daycamp experiences for kids at The Farmers’ Museum, art classes for kids at the Feminore Art Museum and great events such as Taste of the Sublime (full disclosure: my husband works there, and I am friends with many of the other folks there, so I have first-hand knowledge of just how dedicated and passionate they are about what the museums stand for).
Just a few miles south of Cooperstown, Foothills Performing Arts Center is bringing in one amazing act after another from NYC and all over the country. Under new leadership, the team there has focused its mission on providing theater and entertainment that is just not available in this community.
Disclosure: Foothills is a client of ours, and we are honestly humbled by the work they’re doing. Instead of maintaining the status quo and wishing for the staff and money to run the type of venue they dream of, they jumped in and did it. And if it means their executive director is clearing martini glasses at Thursday’s cabaret night, that’s what they’re committed to doing.
And now, just outside of Cooperstown, the new Rangjung Yeshe Gomde meditation center has opened under the leadership of Phakchok Rinpoche. The center’s first weeklong retreat will happen Aug. 30 through Sept. 5.
Honestly, I could go on and on. Every day, it seems like we see one more activity, event or exhibition that makes us slap our foreheads and say, “What a great idea.”
What excited us most, though, is that we believe this type of cultural and creative activity is self-regenerating. Two art galleries don’t split each other’s potential in half; they double each other’s potential.
And in this economy, it’s going to be the creative, collaborative and innovative communities that thrive.
We’re still finalizing the list, but here is the preliminary list of workshops we’re offering this fall.
Here is the coolest part: If you don’t see a class you want to take, suggest one and we’ll try to find a teacher.
And if you have a special talent or knowledge you would like to share (anything from painting to converting car engines to biodiesel), you could make a couple bucks sharing it with the rest of us. Again, add it in the comments.
Here is the lineup so far:
Elementary and Middle School Classes
Design KIDS – Grades 6-8 Graphic design is also for kids! Ever look at a piece of artwork and wonder what makes it so successful? We will learn the rules of design and how to apply them. Using a variety of hands-on media we will explore color; integrating text and images; layout techniques and other principles of design to create beautiful balanced compositions. At the end of the session students will have a portfolio to present for a final critique.
Fairy Tales
In this class, younger writers and pre-writers will learn the elements of creating vivid settings, compelling characters and unforgettable stories. We will read a variety of fairy tales – some familiar, and many that are probably new, as well as invite members of the class to share their own favorite fairy tales.
Mysteries, Ghost Stories and Folk Tales
When the leaves turn crimson and orange, creative minds will conjure delightfully frightful mysteries, ghost stories and folk tales. We will learn about the history of this type of storytelling, learn the elements of keeping our readers on the edge of their trembling seats and even take a local ghost story field trip to learn about Cooperstown’s local haunts.
Magical Settings and Characters
From Aslan and the White Witch to Harry Potter and Voldemoort, young readers have always been entranced by magical characters and settings. In this class, we’ll venture into the realm of fantastical settings and characters, learn what makes them come to life and create a little of our own magic in the process.
Wild Tales with Tails
From Winnie the Pooh (and Tigger, too) to The Cat in the Hat to the Cowardly Lion, come of literature’s best-loved characters hail from the animal kingdom. In this class, we will learn more about the animals of New York with a visit to The Farmers’ Museum’s “Wild Times” exhibit and a tour of the working 1840s-style farm. Each student will choose an animal from the exhibit or from the farm as a main character to research and bring to life in a story.
Gallery Hoppers
Cooperstown and the nearby towns and villages have a wealth of galleries, museums and other cultural offerings. This group will meet once a week to visit exhibits and museums discuss what we’ve seen, and then create our own exhibit about what we’ve learned.
One-Day Workshops for High School Students
* Writing a Great College Application Essay (without selling out, selling your soul or making anything up)
* Don’t Friend the Dean: How Facebook, MySpace and Blogs Can Help or Hurt Job and College Applications
* Career GPS – Setting a College and Career Course for True Happiness
Adult Classes
Sheep to Shawl
A beginner’s guide (or refresher) on fiber arts, knitting and crochet. This class will meet once weekly, and will include instruction on knitting and crocheting, as well as field trips to learn how wool and alpaca fiber is collected, prepared and spun. We’ll also try our hands (no pun intended) at spinning, learn how to read patterns, determine the best yarns for a project (and the best projects for specific yarns). All skill levels are welcome and encouraged to join this class, as we hope everyone will learn something and enjoy time spent with fellow knitters.
Memoir
Writing your personal history is a powerful, exciting and restorative exercise. In this class, we will take the clay of raw experience and transform it into art. We’ll explore creative techniques for finding your stories, crafting compelling narratives and using vibrant, evocative language.
We offer creative marketing services with a conscience to businesses and organizations driven by a passion to improve lives and communities. That means non-profits, arts and cultural organizations, museums, schools and businesses of all sizes that are driven by a cause.
We maintain a small and selective client list so that we are able to give each client the attention it deserves.
We also support and nurture creativity in our community through workshops in all types of creative arts. The workshops provide children and adults with new avenues of learning and expression, while giving talented creative teachers a financially sustainable way to share their gifts.
Of course, the story of how we got here is more complicated, and more interesting.
Paperkite operates on a very simple ideal: The work we do should make a difference. Not only should it make a difference for our clients’ bottom lines (that’s a given), but it should contribute real value to the world.
It’s a pretty radical idea for an industry that brings into the world such things as Alex the Stroh’s dog.
How we aim to do that is a little different as well.
You don’t have to count the alcoholics on Mad Men to know that ad and marketing “creatives” have long struggled with the meaningfulness of their work. For me, personally, I have frequently felt a tension between creating something and marketing something that someone else has created.
That’s because traditional marketing is pretty icky – like tapping strangers on the shoulder in the middle of their suppers and shouting in their faces about a product or service they probably don’t need.
If you’re interrupting good people’s lives with spammy, irritating campaigns, it’s never going to feel as good as creating something new and valuable, helping people solve real problems and performing a genuinely helpful service.
We want our work to make people feel good – that includes our clients’ customers, our clients and ourselves.
If you think we would be a good fit for your marketing needs, drop us an e-mail at hello@paperkitecreative.com. We would love to talk.
From the outside of a chrysalis, it looks like the caterpillar has created a peaceful, snug little room in which to rest before emerging as a butterfly.
The truth is far more dramatic – radical, even.
Like most of us, caterpillars spend the caterpillar portion of their lives growing. As they grow, they shed their old skins, and become slightly larger, slightly different versions of their pre-growth selves. Then one day, something tells them that simply shedding the old skin for a larger version is not going to do. Something tells them that what they require is a grand, brilliant and utterly seismic shift.
You and I know what’s coming, but maybe the caterpillar doesn’t. Certainly her caterpillar cohorts don’t, and they don’t understand her restlessness.
“Just shed that skin like always,” they tell her. “You’ll get bigger and bigger. One day, we’ll be huge – the largest caterpillars to roam the land. We’ll devour mighty oaks in one chomp!”
She’s not interested in that, though. She has this idea that things could be really different. Really different.
So instead of shedding her skin for a new one that’s more or less the same, only larger, she builds herself a safe place to create something almost inconceivable.
Inside, everything breaks down. Literally.
Her legs and antennae and her hungry little munching mouth all break down. For all practical purposes, the caterpillar is dead – toast. Or, more accurately, soup. What’s left is a formless ooze that contains the essence of what it means to be a caterpillar, which happens to be identical to the essence of what it means to be a butterfly.
It’s absolutely not that remarkable. It happens every day. It may be happening just a few feet or yards from where you are sitting right now. But try telling that caterpillar how ordinary it is.
Try telling the butterfly that what happened to her was run-of-the-mill.
Fables are usually packed with a point, and this one is no different. The lesson here is that remarkable, unforeseeable change is both deeply meaningful and entirely achievable.
That’s the standard we’ve set for ourselves at Paperkite Creative Communications. A few of us have been working behind the scenes – in a chrysalis, if you will – brainstorming, dreaming and planning. Over the couple weeks, we’re going to introduce ourselves in a bit more depth and explain more about our vision.
We hope you’ll follow. And we hope you’ll add to our momentum.
The first of our Summer 09 Creative Workshops begins Monday. I feel just like the students must feel – excited and a little nervous. I can’t wait to see what we create together.
I’ve collected a dozen or so cool stories that we’re going to read, and some activities to get all the creative juices flowing. Who knows what magic is going to happen?
Paperkite Creative Communications specializes in creative marketing with a conscience.
For Our Clients:
We help cause-driven businesses and organizations refine and share their unforgettable stories. Our services include branding, identity, social media and marketing strategy services.
For Our Community:
We nurture creativity in students of all ages through a series of community-sourced workshops in arts, design, creative writing and more.
