Check out these super cool TV spots we just finished for one of our favorite clients – Bella Pietra. We wanted to create TV spots that had the same WOW factor that you feel when their stone is placed inside your home. Their stone really does bring your home to life. Enjoy!

These Olympic torches are perfect,
I want to one hang over my desk.
I love the winter olympics.
Tonight was awesome. Seeing the plains indians dancing did my heart good. (being part plains indian my self) My wife thought i was crazy when i got up and danced with them.

What is your favorite sport of the winter Olympics.

"I want the world. I want the whole world. I want to lock it all up in my pocket. It's my bar of chocolate. Give it to me now." – Veruca Salt

I came across a really good “food for thought” article from Advertising Age the other day that I thought I should it share with all of the advertising and marketing devotees that we have following our little blog. It’s an article about the 10 basic “wants” that all people desire in life. It’s all stuff we really already know but it’s nice to have it all bundled for us in a neat package. As marketing and advertising professionals we always try to find that nugget that will get people on the hook and make them open their wallets. The best ways to motivate people are always emotional triggers – advertising that gets at us emotionally usually works better than anything else. One of my teachers in ad school described it this way…there are three types of advertising 1)Features advertising – which just gives you the facts about a product or service such as, “This sports car has a 450 horsepower engine” 2) Attributes advertising – which talks about all the things you can do with a product or service such as “This sports car can go really fast”  and 3) Benefits advertising – which address the emotional reasons why we buy things such as “This sports car will help me get women.” The best advertising and marketing always address the benefits and the emotional pull products and services have on us.  So what are those emotional pulls? That’s where the following article  from Brian Martin of AdAge comes in:

Remember to Give Them What They Want

Successful Brands Do a Good Job of Satisfying People’s 10 Basic Desires

Brands spend more than $450 billion each year to influence us. They wouldn’t spend that kind of money unless they knew something we didn’t know.

The most-successful brands don’t focus on what we need; they focus on what we want. We need a credit card; we want an American Express Black card. We need a cellphone; we want the yet-to-be-released iPhone 4G.

Fortunately for brands, when it comes to identifying what people want, we aren’t particularly complex. The human mind seeks to satisfy 10 primary wants. Direct your actions toward meeting as many as possible, and your brand will grow exponentially.

So what do people want, exactly?

1. To feel safe and secure.

2. To feel comfortable.

3. To be cared for and connected to others.

4. To be desired by others.

5. To be free to do what we want.

6. To grow and become more.

7. To serve others and give back.

8. To be surprised and excited.

9. To believe there is a higher purpose.

10. To feel that they matter.

To read the full text of this article go to: http://adage.com/cmostrategy/article?article_id=141897

Like most people, when I see a product I can usually decide if I like it or not. For example on sight I like most chocolate (especially in nice packaging), Moleskin notebooks, Paperchase stuff (can’t help it, the stuff works like a magnet when I’m at Borders) and, of course anything Apple (duh). But every once in a while along comes a product that I just can not put into the “like” or “not like” category. Instead it hovers between in its own special domain, usually to my embarrassment. There is just something about it that makes me want to love it, but there is too much about it to hate. On the list are: the Snuggie (I want one… NO I DON’T!) and mouse-click sound scripts (Travis, PLEASE add gunshot mouse-clicks to kilimanjarorifles.com!). My newest addition is the Wooly Vagabond. It is crazy. You can carry your plant around in your purse — its awful — its awesome!

Don’t be surprised if you see me carrying my pet plant around town… nope, never!

Commercial art must be vigilant over color trends for the season as well as for decades. When designing logos and corporate identity packages we need to reflect not only the attitude and personality of the company, but also the color theory that applies – all while being conscience of the years color forecast and trends. Promotional items or marketing materials with a shorter shelf life should pay closer attention to the current trends. As designers, once we have overall awareness of an array of color information we also need to review the buyer profile and specifically target that audience for color cues that trigger a positive response.
This year’s spring and summer color trends seem to be filled with warm hopeful hues across the color palette – Red with blue undertones, Green as natural grass, Yellow warm and buttery, Blue with a cast of green or purple.

For more information about color trends, follow these links:
http://www.fashiontrendsetter.com/downloads/Lenzing-Trends-Autumn-Winter-2010-11.pdf
http://www.pantone.com/downloads/articles/pdfs/Pantone-FCR-sp2010f.pdf

I was sitting in my room, rummaging through my purse looking for my pen, when I realized how much ‘junk’ I had in there. As I sorted through some things I started to wonder why I had purchased the items that had collected at the bottom of my bag.

Before I started working for OrangeRoc I don’t think I would have given it a second thought but now I’ve realized that for me, the items that I purchase end up at the bottom of my bag for the same basic reason… design or packaging. I have about 7 pens in my one purse, all of which are the same brand. The first reason for me purchasing this brand of ink pen? The look, the way it writes ranks third and the price, dead last. I also found that I have 2 different lip balms. One of which was reasonable in price and served the purpose of winter days and chapped lips. The other was purchased because it came in a little silver tin with a cute label, and cost of $7.50 was NOT one of the reasons for the purchase, and although it works great for chapped lips, I have to be honest and say that I hardly ever use it. If I had to be totally honest, I’d have to admit to making the purchase just so I could have the cute little shopping bag with the purple dragonfly on it. I guess it goes to show that sometimes it’s the packaging that gets us and not necessarily functionality or necessity.

From a consumer to all you businesses out there… Branding as well as packaging are both key players in a company and it’s marketing.

An 81-year-old Honolulu woman died yesterday after she was hit by a sport utility vehicle as she crossed Pali Highway in a marked crosswalk. I often saw this little old lady crossing the street as I drove into work. It is so sad.

But, really isn’t a surprise. Every Pali driver has experienced the confusion of traffic stopping because of bumper-to-bumper traffic. It just took ONE driver NOT seeing her in the crosswalk.

This type of tragedy is avoidable through an already existing creative design solution:

In pavement lighting. In this case the solution is already created and should NOW be implemented.

The challenge for all designers should be to find solutions to all sorts of problems BEFORE they are needed. That is what it means to be a creative problem solver. But unfortunatly it seems like it takes an accident and a shock to put action into motion.

A call to all creatives: Let’s find problems; find creative solutions. And make things happen.

It’s that time of year again, the time when phone books wait anxiously on our doorsteps like lost puppies searching for a new home. So what do you do with them? Because of the internet, they have become obsolete for the majority of us. According to banthephonebook.org, each year 5 million trees are cut down for phone book production alone. We can all do our part to help protect our environment. If you do not need one, please take a few minutes to contact your local phone book company and opt out of phone book delivery. Let’s start 2010 by making a positive impact on our environment.

Ahh, aerial photography. What an inspirational, wondrous little gift for our creative minds. Aerial photography provides us with a view of our environment from a perspective we aren’t used to seeing; thus providing us with a fantastic new way of looking at things. Aerial photography was first practiced in the 1800’s by photographers in hot-air balloons, and is now quite a popular thing! Here are some breathtaking aerial photos for your inspiration.

Clicking on the images will take you to where we found them, and will allow you to see a larger version and learn more about the photographers.

Read the rest of this entry »

Well here we are, smack-dab in the middle of this holiday season! But this year the mood in the air is a little different. Responsibility is in-style, and spending in excess seems to be on-the-out. Although this holiday season may not look like we’re holding back a bit in spending, we may be willing to wear last year’s fashions or hold off another year for that special vacation. What we’re celebrating this year is more than a date on the calendar; it’s relational. And when it comes to friends and family, somehow we’re always willing to go one step further than we really should. So from all of us here at OrangeRoc we wish you all a fantastic and merriment filled holiday season!