TIM HALPIN WRITES

How does a local bank promote its ability to work with family-owned businesses? By communicating that they, too, are a family-owned business that understands the struggles small business owners must endure to succeed.

With product names like Chocolate Bellini, Blue Typhoon and Agatha Black, it's easy to come up with a Twitter concept that promotes the wide variety of stone surfaces and has fun doing it.

We faced a challenge when pitching Anheuser-Busch In Bev’s “Beyond Beer” business. One of their recent acquisitions was Hiball, a niche energy water with a small but mighty following on the west coast. To give this regional brand national attention, we chose to focus on the positive, clean energy of HiBall and present it as a powerful energy source and an elemental means to hydrate and boost energy naturally. This, we believed, would resonate with consumers seeking energy drinks with real ingredients, clean formulas and no “crash.” The client agreed, and we won their full line of “Beyond Beer” brands.

Schlafly Beer, a rapidly-growing microbrewer in the shadow of one of the biggest breweries in the world, wanted a cheeky, memorable campaign to help establish their cheeky, memorable line of beers. So we created a new beer-centric vocabulary to run as outdoor boards and multiple-page alternative weekly ads.

I had the privilege of working for nine years on a classic campaign for Jack Daniel's that had been running for nearly half a century. Each of these "Postcards From Lynchburg" ran only once in a given publication; therefore, we were tasked with creating 20-30 brand-new ads each year. A fun but formidable task, considering the whole idea of the campaign had always been that nothing had changed about Jack Daniel's since 1866.

My years as a semi-devout Catholic were long behind me when it came time to create a campaign to recruit teachers for local Catholic schools. We decided to keep the religious stuff in the background and focus on community-building aspects like togetherness and fellowship.

Many folks outside Missouri don't realize that select regions of our state have the ideal terroir for producing fine wines. This campaign was designed to let them know that, but it was more about the bonds that can form over a great glass of wine.

One of the world’s leading heart hospitals, St. Luke’s in Houston wanted to tell success stories that not only touted their legendary expertise, but did so with emotion and humanity.

It's always a struggle..er, challenge...to create awareness for smaller local banks. We wanted to keep interest rates and percentage points to a minimum, while emphasizing the intrinsic localness of the bank.

It's no secret that train travel isn't what it used to be. This company really wanted to bring back the romance of an intimate dinner on a moving train.

The Saint Louis Zoo is a wonderful place. Routinely ranked as the nation's #1 zoological park, it's a free adventure with something to captivate animal lovers and adventurers of any age. During the summer months in St. Louis, television commercials and out-of-home boards are ubiquitous. When we ask, "Can You Come Out And Play," the answer is invariably yes.

I have a wealth of experience creating and executing ideas for broadcast and digital platforms. I've been lucky to work with some of the finest directors around. They say the 30-second commercial is dead, but they've been saying that for an awfully long time.

I've been doing this for awhile. Here are a few spots from years back. Sometimes MANY years back. I apologize for the less-than-stellar video quality on a few of these.

It's considered the red-headed stepchild of broadcast production (no offense to actual red-headed stepchildren), but I just LOVE writing radio spots. Creating characters and environments without benefit of visuals is a challenge, and if you need proof that not everybody can do it, just switch on your local rock station.

Country-rock superstars Zac Brown Band partnered with Landshark for tour sponsorship in 2013. My team created a number of retail and promotional pieces for this partnership, including three limited-edition interactive cans, elaborate store displays, loads of digital content and exclusive behind-the-scenes videos. Here’s an overview.

As Creative Director on Treehouse Foods, I supervised the creation of packaging for numerous private label products in multiple categories. My team designed the packaging; I handled the concepts, product naming and package copy. Here are a few of my favorites.