Know Your Zone - The City of Winnipeg Winter Parking Ban campaign.

General Grader

If you've been following along, you know that back in early September, Picante was chosen by the City of Winnipeg to develop a communication campaign for the Public Works Department regarding the changes to the Winter Parking Bans.  The clients put their trust in us and challenged us to come up with something eyecatching and different.

Lieutenant Loader

The result is Know Your Zone.  We developed two characters, General Grader and Lieutenant Loader, voiced by Winnipeg personalities Laurie Mustard and Jim Ingebrigtsen who did an amazing job creating unique, charismatic characters.

Thanks to Nolan Balzer at daCapo for engineering the audio session and directing the music choice.   Then the fabulous Adam, Simon and Brad at Elemental Motion Media brought the characters to life in the animated commercials,

The multi-talented Lori Dyck from Wildfire Online worked tirelessly with the IT team at Public Works and Corporate Communications, Nasir, Ashley and Nancy to make sure the website www.knowyourzone.winnipeg.ca  was ready for action this morning.  The public is encouraged to sign up for email and Twitter notices relating to the residential parking ban. You can even look up the snow zones on your mobile device, making this truly a cutting edge communication program. 

Vertical Billboard

Bustail

Knowledgable and experienced Kathryne Grisim put together a comprehensive media plan and Charlene looked after design and layout for a host of print applications,  You'll soon see Know Your Zone on vertical billboards, newspaper, bustails and electronic billboards. In a campaign with numerous components, date changes and many approval levels, Kathryne and Char never lost the smile in their voices. 

It's very difficult to put into words, what an amazing team was involved in this project.  ...and I'm supposed to be a writer.   Ken Allen - thank you for your tireless, passionate work on this campaign. You were the Commander in Chief on this operation (at least our end of it) and need to be credited for being an exceptional project manager and enthusiastic cheerleader.  I think it's safe to say we'll be staying in touch - this is a relationship I've come to greatly value...feels more like family than client/agency.   And thanks to Ken Boyd, Stan Siu, Bruce McPhail and Brad Sacher for putting your trust in us.

It was our first opportunity to work with Tammy Melesko at Corporate Communications.  Tammy you were so wonderful to work with.  It was a distinct pleasure getting to know you better and I am sure we'll continue to stay in touch.  We were reunited with the amazing Steve West - how we've missed you Steve - Steve was a big part of the original planning for Just Slow Down for the Winnipeg Police Service and it was so great to have the chance to work together again.

Nasir Noor, again, what a positive, genuine, calm and caring individual you are.  No matter how complicated things became, you were open to discussion and so willing to go the extra mile. 

I'm very proud of Know Your Zone...it will definitely go down as one of the highlights of my career.

I hope everyone takes the time to find out their snow zone and that the Winnipeg Parking Authority can't find anyone to ticket or tow next time we are in combat with Major Snowfall!  (I cannot take credit for that one - that was Ken Allen's idea! )

Some behind the scenes shots: 

The Dream Team - The group responsible for the Know Your Zone campaign.

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Jim Ingebrigtsen and Laurie Mustard lending their golden voices to Lieutenant Loader and General Grader.

Commander In Chief - Ken Allen

Audio Engineer Extraordinaire - Nolan Balzer from daCapo.

Ken Boyd at today's launch.

Ken Allen describing the components of the campaign.

Ken explaining how the website works to help citizens look up their residential street snow zone.

An excellent turn out by the media.

Remember way back when?  In mid-September we held our first"creative" meeting at Cafe Dario.  Ken Allen and Tammy Melesko.

Congratulations Bothwell!

Bothwell Cheese, one of Manitoba's finest companies celebrated 75 years in business on Friday.  The team out at Bothwell planned a fun event to mark the milestone.  We were treated to smokies, poutine and definitely a fine array of Bothwell's finest cheese products.  The event was hosted by David Northcott from Winnipeg Harvest.  The Honourable Vic Toews brought greetings from the federal government.  And a host of other dignitaries were on hand to help celebrate.  We're proud to have developed Bothwell's distinctive 75th Anniversary logo and congratulate Ivan Balenovic and his staff for a wonderful event and for one of Manitoba's most successful businesses.