Partner: Ocotal Coffee and SUNY Geneseo
SUNY Geneseo students had traveled to Nicaragua, met the farmers growing their coffee, and helped organize a direct import relationship that put that coffee on campus. It was a genuinely remarkable thing. Almost nobody knew it was happening.
The supply chain was already the story. We just had to tell it in a way that made people feel the distance those beans traveled and the relationships that made it possible.
That meant going to the source. We interviewed students, professors, and the college communications team to pull out the details that turn a supply chain into something personal. A student sitting with farmers in Nicaragua, drinking the same coffee that would end up in a cup on campus weeks later. That's not a marketing angle. That's the thing itself.
From those interviews we built the full brand and name, then distributed the story across press releases, collaborative social media, print ads, posters, and point of sale materials. The goal wasn't awareness for its own sake. It was to create a felt connection between the people on campus pouring a cup and the people in Ocotal who grew it.
Personal, specific messaging did what broad campaign language never could: it gave students and faculty a reason to care about where their coffee came from.
Simple by design. The name, mark, and color palette reflect what the coffee actually is: natural, direct, nothing hidden in the middle.
The frame approach gave us a repeatable structure to bring in as many real photos as possible. Students and farmers and families, side by side, across every medium. Not stock. Not illustration. The actual people. That visual choice reinforced the core argument: this relationship is real, and you can see it.
Strategy, Creative Direction, Design, Interviewing
Collaborators: CAS Marketing DirectorBecky Stewart,Photojournalist Kris Dressen, University Professors, SUNY Geneseo Communications Department. Thank you to the El Sauce Service Learning Program and Java Joe
*currently in Lakeville, NY
I’m working on a balance between the things that make me happy: family, giving back, and creative strategy. Like most people I only have 24 hours a day, that doesn’t leave time for everything, sorry Facebook.
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