Cradles to Crayons
Video
Community Partner
This semester, our community partner is Cradles to Crayons Philadelphia. They help to ensure that all children have the resources they need to thrive, whether that be clothing, shoes, or school supplies. Cradles to Crayons uses the phrase “Quality=Dignity” as one of their mottos to live by. This is painted on one of their warehouse walls as inspiration. Clothing insecurity is a major issue that affects many children in the Philadelphia Area every year. Cradles to Crayons works with social workers to provide children ages 0-12 with the clothing and tools that they need to be successful. These social workers may refer specific children to Cradles to Crayons if they notice that the child is struggling in any way with clothing or supplies. Cradles to Crayons will then create kid packs to send to the children. These packs can include school supplies or clothing bundles. The clothing pack may include up to a weeks worth of clothing including socks and underwear, as well as hats, gloves, and coats for the wintertime. Each set of clothing is matched and planned by a volunteer who makes sure that multiple outfits can be made from each article.
Challenge
We collaborated with Cradles to Crayons to create a promotional video for their Annual Un-gala. The annual Un-Gala is part of a two-day event where they hold a gala at night in the warehouse and a full day of sorting, packing and organizing the next morning. As a group, we created a call-to-action video for Cradles to Crayons that not only brought awareness to their main focus on childhood poverty, but that also inspired people to donate to the organization. Cradles to Crayons had a list of requests to include in the final video: an emotional moment to capture the hearts of viewers, an overall call-to-action theme, and a feature of their new warehouse or “Giving Factory.”
We knew it would be challenging to include each of these requests, so we initially struggled to come up with a video that not only incorporated everything that they wanted, but to also create a video that was cohesive and professional looking. Another challenge we faced pertained to scheduling; figuring out everyone’s schedules to make trips to go to their Giving Factory, blocking out time to film our other scenes outside of the Giving Factory, and having enough time for final video editing. In total, we went to the Giving Factory four times, and filmed the other scenes on Saint Joseph’s campus. Editing was the most time-consuming task in our project, taking over twenty four total hours in total.
All of this hard work payed off. Through their Un-gala fundraiser, Cradles to Crayons was able to successfully raise over $500,000.
Strategic Thinking
Our group was intimidated when we first learned of our project details. For most members of our group, this was the first time taking Beautiful Social. This was also the first time a few of us had ever created a video project. With Cradles to Crayons being such an established organization, we felt a lot of pressure to create something incredible for them. The ideas for our video project did not come about until after our first visit to the Giving Factory. We were able to personally experience all that the factory was capable of and after meeting with the Cradles to Crayons family, our project goals started to come together. By the end of the first week or two we knew what our task was: Creating a video to be shown at their annual fundraising gala that would help them reach their donor, volunteer, and partner audiences while helping them make their $500,000 dollar goal.
We approached this task by brainstorming multiple ideas that would best showcase their values. Some of our ideas consisted of telling a story of a boy who is made fun of at school for his old shoes and interviewing various people involved in the organization.
We utilized the Golden Circle Theory to find the main focus of the organization. In our film we strived to show the “why” of the organization, and tell people their story in a way that sells them on their message.
We also followed the rule of thirds when filming the interview scenes. This allowed us to keep a certain aesthetic throughout the still shots. This made the video look more professional and put together.
Storyboarding helped us understand what exactly to film, as well as how we should organize the video. By doing this, it made our lives easier with filming and editing it all.
Results
The results were great. We ended up creating a video that checked all the boxes on Cradles to Crayons wish list. By working diligently and being on top of the editing we were able to finish the video. We used a lot of the advice and strategies we learned in class, as well as outside research. The Un-gala event ended up getting great feedback from their attendees, and with the efforts of our video, we were able to help Cradles to Crayons reach their fundraising goal of half a million dollars. Cradles to Crayons of Philadelphia plans on using the video extensively with school engagement in 2020. They also plan on uploading the video to their homepage after the holidays as well as using it during school volunteer sessions. Their Un-gala event had a total of 357 participants, it reached a 1725 people, and created 185 engagements. We also provided Cradles to Crayons with a social media analysis. Our hope for this is that it helps them improve their social media presence and build an awareness about poverty in the Greater Philadelphia area.