Getting the message out
Local agency doesn’t let COVID-19 stop anti-drinking and driving campaign
Richard Kuhn knows how to execute a vision.
It’s what he’s been doing for years.
As the executive director of RK Venture, an Albuquerquebased creative agency, Kuhn is used to putting out fires when it comes to projects.
In mid-March, just like everyone else, he had to think in a different way.
The live-action concepts RK Venture put together for the New Mexico Department of Transportation were out the window.
No cast or crews were allowed.
The shutdown forced the agency to take a different path — the animation route.
“The summer campaign is big for NMDOT,” he says. “Typically we’re doing live action stuff and we’re hiring New Mexico crew and actors. I knew we couldn’t do anything like that. We came up with animated ideas.”
The agency teamed up with illustration duo Cachetejacks for a series of animated spots.
The videos hit the mark on NMDOT’s desired messaging of stopping drinking and driving, while incorporating the reality of what summer looks like in 2020, facemasks and all.
Kuhn says it was a scramble to put the campaigns together.
Because of social distancing, everyone worked remotely, from as far away as Berlin.
“When we first did the spots, we didn’t have masks,” he says. “We wanted it to represent life today. We went back in and put masks on all of the characters.”
RK Venture also created the “One Cough Can Kill” COVID-19 awareness campaign with Emergency Medicine Physician Arthur Sullivan.
Launched in March, the campaign offers concise, factual information about COVID-19, links to vetted resources, and videos of Sullivan answering user-submitted questions.
In addition to the site, the campaign has a strong presence on the expected social platforms.
It was created as a public service by RK Venture and Sullivan.
“It was important to make the correct information available to the general public,” Kuhn says.
Kuhn has done a lot of work in the private sector, though his real passion comes with working with behavior change.
RK Venture is known for its ENDWI campaign. Since beginning work with NMDOT, New Mexico’s drunk driving numbers have decreased.
“When we started, there were 221 people being killed a year,” he says of drunk driving fatalities. “There has been a tremendous drop.
“When we created the ENDWI campaign, it was an honest look into the problem. The campaign has been used nationwide.”
“It has grabbed people’s attention and sometimes you have to be controversial to make changes in behavior,” Kuhn says. “It’s about people coming together and seeing the community embrace those changes.”
At the beginning of the pandemic, the agency was hired to rebrand Los Angeles International Airport.
“Then the world changed and everything stopped,” Kuhn says. “We’re working slowly to get everything back on track, but it’s going to take time.”