Model and Strategy
Building on safety messages of our ‘Don’t Be a Dumbass,' ‘Playthings,' and ‘American Man’ ads, Evolve will use the same friendly-smart approach to "sell" gun safety and storage on Black Friday with ‘The Perfect Toy.’ Since the gun IS often kiddingly referred to as the perfect toy for Dad, we’ll use the biggest toy day to communicate this dual connection and promote the rules and behaviors of gun safety during the biggest gun and accessories sales day and season.
Using the analogs of other industries that have successfully aligned children's safety and adult safety is important when considering the long-term process in shifting cultural thinking. To illustrate: when you buckle a child’s seatbelt, it reminds you to buckle your own until it becomes automatic. If you would take the car keys from a friend who is drunk, would you let yourself drive drunk? Focusing on child safety opens the window to let this message penetrate and permeate the safety culture first-and-foremost of responsible gun ownership.
Impact
Culture change is a long-game strategy, occurring over long intervals, usually coming in bursts of increments. Innovative efforts have to continue to populate the space and keep testing and learning to move the process forward. The mission of promoting and enhancing gun safety necessarily requires familiarity and understanding of the lifestyle and ethos of gun owners and communities. They own the guns and make the choices that we all care about. Evolve, by its mission, meets people on their turf, honing in on the place of shared aspirational safety values.
Evolve programs are closely-watched pilot efforts, causing attention and pivots in this wide-chasm safety category. Evolve has to be both effective bridge-builder and innovator. Most gun companies and organizations are entrenched in a brand ID and risk averse. Evolve took the first steps innovating safety within. Evolve takes analogs from the alcohol industry and the Truth effort. Since 1982 there has been a reduction of 74% in drunk driving and 63% have been a designated-driver. It took a generation to embed "who's driving?" into the lexicon of responsible driving culture, accomplished by massive efforts to pilot/ladder efforts along with an eventual mobilization of the alcohol industry.
Evolve's success as an outsider in an extremely complex and politicized category – those hard to reach places – is unprecedented. This has been done with little money, by mobilizing an army of in-kind creative forces and committed industry individuals. The question Evolve is most asked: when is your next campaign coming out?
Leadership
-
Rebecca Bond
Founder