Fostering Innovation | Developing Talent & Capabilities | Driving Business Results
Projects
Good & Gather Market
As part of Target's efforts to improve consumer impressions of fresh grocery and go from just selling food to celebrating food, we developed a whole new signing package for the open market in "PFresh" store formats. In my role as lead creative on Food & Beverage, I led this effort from brief to proof of concept in a few short months. After several oohs and aahs from executive leadership in spring of '24, we brought the Good & Gather Market to life by the fall in over 1000 stores.
Featuring striped awnings atop the coolers to create the feeling of a self-contained market and chalk-style illustrations and typography at the product level, this approach increased produce sales along with consumer perceptions of fresh assortment and hands-on care.
Agency: KNOCK
“Target Takes On” video series
How-to videos are often an integral component of successful branded YouTube channels. In an effort to create more of this kind of programming for Target, I led the development and production of the "Target Takes On" series with the agency Portal A. Focusing on kitchen/food, home décor, fashion and beauty, the idea was centered around Target being the solution to common issues that young adults run into as they're just starting out on their own.
From the initial brief in early August to the first video launch in October, we created scripts and storyboards, developed a look and tone, designed and built a modular, multi-purpose set, casted three popular YouTube creators, shot six videos over 10 days, and edited and finalized in less than 4 weeks. I'm proud of how the content landed in a sweet spot of feeling both native to the platform but still distinctly like the brand.
Agency: Portal A
Platforms: YouTube, Instagram
“Let’s Target” video series
The idea: let's see what happens when we pair up two creators/celebrities to chat, laugh and entertain over a shared activity and their mutual love of Target. The result was the popular YouTube series "Let's Target."
Originally launched in 2019 and shot in a Target store as the pairs shop together, it was re-conceived to work within the production and travel restrictions of 2020 and 2021. Each pair received a box on their doorstep with a few of their favorite products, along with a few more to work on an activity together. I had the opportunity to lead seasons 2 and 3 on the Target side, partnering with Target's internal Social team and the agency Portal A on story concepts, outlines, casting and production.
Season 3 won a 2021 YouTube Streamys Award for Best Branded Content Series.
Agency: Portal A
Platforms: YouTube, Instagram
Enjoy the Show
This spot was originally conceived and produced for the "Silence Your Phones" messages prior to movies shown in theaters, starting in May 2020. However, when COVID hit, we quickly reconcepted and repurposed the footage and message to instead welcome viewers to family movie nights on NBC/Universal networks and Peacock throughout 2020.
I was the Creative Director on this spot, leading an internal team of an art director, copywriter, motion director and producer. We concepted the story, then worked with the animation studio Scholar to bring it to life. In addition, we reached out to NBCU during concepting and developed a partnership where we could leverage some of their most popular properties to make the concept even cooler, including Trolls, How to Train Your Dragon and Jurassic World.
Agency: Scholar
Platforms: Broadcast, Streaming
Target Drive Up
In the summer of 2020, folks from the Roundel Media team at Target called a meeting with a few of us who worked on Target's fulfillment services campaign to discuss a crisis they were having: how to generate vendor income without a new Services campaign, several months into a pandemic. The long-running Target Run campaign was over, all fulfillment services work was devoted to COVID Safety messages and there was no way to shoot anything new with all production having been shut down.
In the midst of a meeting full of "can't do that" and "nope, that's not happening," I remembered a couple of videos we'd produced in the summer of '19 that I thought we could repurpose, tweak to allow for brand and product placements, and produce, safely and cost-efficiently. The result was a new Drive Up campaign that could be refreshed every month with new brands. Over the next year, this campaign made my media partners very happy while generating roughly $20 million in profit.
Agency: Target Creative & Motion504
Platforms: YouTube, Meta
Pride 2020
Among one of the many challenges 2020 brought was this question: How do you celebrate Pride in a pandemic? Our answer: show our solidarity with the LGBTQ community and why Pride is about more than a parade or party. It's about the larger family that the community provides.
I led a large team of creatives and producers in making these spots (along with some social extensions), culling through massive amounts of footage from community members and revising scripts all the way through delivery based on the ever-evolving landscape and changing directives from leadership. I'm really proud of the positive message we created at a time when the world definitely needed one.
Agency: Target Creative
Platforms: Digital, Social, Streaming
@TargetTag
After having spent several years creating campaigns targeting the maturing Gen X and growing Millennial audiences, Target realized that a newly ascendant generation had largely been ignored. I was tapped to lead a small but mighty team of creatives, strategists and project managers to tackle this challenge: How do we create a body of work where Gen Z feels seen and valued (while we also promoted the new brands designed with them in mind)?
The solution was @TargetTag (which became @TargetActually after a couple years), a standalone Instagram handle featuring organic content created by up-and-coming Gen Z creators and influencers. In a very quick 2-1/2 months, we developed our mission and tone, identified 30 creators (artists, models, dancers, writers and more), and set about planning and commissioning a steady stream of content through a new. always-on op model. We hosted a two-day creator convention/incubator to get the good vibes and content rolling, and quickly developed a substantial following with virtually no paid media support. Over the next 4 months we posted content to the feed nearly every day (until IG told us, "Maybe slow down a bit." LOL.). This endeavor was eventually absorbed into the larger Target social engine, but it was fun to lead something truly unique for a retailer that size.
Agency: Target Creative
Platforms: Instagram
Target.com re-launch
For several years I led a team of digital art directors and designers on the Apparel and Home categories, and we were part of the re-launch of Target.com on Target’s own platform in 2011 (the site was hosted on the Amazon platform for its first 10 years). While the new site became notorious for a short time for a bevy of technical snafus, I thought we did some cool looking stuff and we were all really proud of the creative. (The back-end issues that were out of our control, not so much.)
Target Christmas online video series
I had the opportunity to lead the digital portion of Target's 2009 Holiday campaign, directing the interactive agency Schematic. We wanted to try a different approach than just the then-standard animated and rich media banners and fancy landing pages. And we also wanted to see if we could make videos that weren't just a translation or lift of what was happening in broadcast.
So we came up with this series of short, funny videos. The message: while you may have your own traditions and gift ideas, it might just be better (and easier) to go to Target. These appeared as the first-of-their-kind shoppable videos as part of the launch of Target's YouTube channel, along with YouTube ads and on Target.com.
Agency: Schematic
Platforms: YouTube, Digital
Target on Facebook
"Let's launch a Facebook page!" Something pretty much every brand said at some point. I was lucky enough to do that for Target as part of the Back to College ‘07 campaign.
Since Facebook was where the college students were in those days, and they had just opened up the platform to people who weren't college students, we thought a brand should be able to join, too. So I directed AKQA San Francisco on the creation of a Group Page with a robust Flash experience (remember those?) that gave students tons of dorm inspiration, helpful checklists and tips for living their best college life. Meanwhile, we also developed a sister experience on Target.com for the parents who pay for all their kids' stuff.
Agency: AKQA
About me
First off, I generally don't like to talk about myself. So I'll keep this short. I've been a creative director and leader of creatives for over 15 years. Started as a copywriter, and I worked my way up to leading campaigns, initiatives and teams across digital, social, video and retail experience channels. Now, I'm a free agent who's passionate about solving creative problems, finding new and different ways of making content, building new capabilities and developing talent and careers.
When I'm not working, you'll find me being a proud dad to an awesome young man (often on a field or in a gym), hanging out with my lovely wife, walking the dog, playing guitar, testing new musical gear, and enjoying the outdoors and keeping up with never-ending yard work in the summer, or clearing snow in the winter.
Hope you like what you see here.
Contact me
If you’d like to learn more about what I do or chat about working together, I’d love to hear from you.