I've written about TIME magazine's year-long Detroit project in this space before, but a friend recently tipped me to this NYT's story about a contest to make Detroit seem cool.
(I'm paraphrasing, of course.)
From the story:
"It may not be the advertising version of 'Mission: Impossible,' but it is certainly a challenging, if not daunting, task: produce a campaign to encourage young and creative people to consider Detroit as a place to live and work.
Cue the Lalo Schifrin theme music.
The effort, called Selling Detroit, is upfront about its intent. 'America’s most struggling city needs to attract business and talent,' a description of the contest begins."
Five advertising agencies in Detroit agreed to take part, and TIME donated all of the ads to the city of Detroit.
The entries are after the jump:
The first three entries:
The second two (sorry about the formatting; I did this quick and dirty):
I know people freak out if I even mention that Memphis shares some of Detroit's problems (though generally to a lesser degree. Calm down, internets), but the copy on this one in particular reminds me of Memphis.
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