A printed booklet with a cozy, wintery, DIY aesthetic, Pride Foundation’s 2020 year-end print piece took the form of a care package full of personal touches from staff, board and supporters. Less than one year into the COVID-19 pandemic, the Community Care Package held messages of care, resilience, and small joys.
Background & Context
The “Year-End Print Piece” has been a staple of the year-end annual campaign for Pride Foundation for many years. Each year-end piece has a unique design and theme; past examples include a pocket constitution and a postcard series that encouraged recipients to write a message to their past or future self.
We wanted our 2020 year-end piece to acknowledge the uncertainty and grief of the past year without reflecting that somber tone back at the reader. Our team envisioned a “care package”—a collection of our favorite recipes, media recommendations, and small DIY projects that would communicate sincere care and solidarity from each individual person at Pride Foundation.
Design Process
With my intimate knowledge of Pride Foundation’s branding and our visioning conversations, was responsible for designing this booklet. My roles included creating mockups, selecting a color scheme and a unique, branded visual theme, laying out each spread, integrating feedback from management, creating web and print-ready finished files, and communicating with our printing vendor from quoting through production.
I also created original vector illustrations for this project. For more on my vector illustrations, check out my illustration page.
A personal touch
Recipes from staff, board, and supporters are accompanied by handwritten notes, commentary, and humor. When cutting a recipe for space was not an option, I used handwritten elements to give this spread the feeling of a well-loved cookbook or personal recipe card.
Campaign-wide branding
I tied our 2020 year-end fundraising campaign to the branding of the Community Care Package, reusing the color palette and vector images in graphics throughout December 2020. This fundraising campaign included bulk marketing emails to our donor base, posts for social media, and a printed New Year’s card.
Reception
Pride Foundation does not always receive much feedback on the year-end print piece series, and it’s even less common to receive gifts explicitly tied to the piece—but 2020 was an exception. Several donors mentioned the Community Care Package in a note with their year-end gift, and even more wrote to our team to share how much they loved the piece. Here are just a few of their comments.
“This is so beautiful and such a gift. Thank you!!!”
“What a stunning representation of values-aligned action and messaging rooted in love! Thank you for this representation of what’s possible in communications between nonprofits and donors. I am beyond inspired by your innovation. ”
“We received our Care Package today. Truly it is amazing! So thoughtful and creative and caring. What a unique thing to do and share. Thank you and thanks for your critical work each day.”
“It made us smile more than any piece of mail in a long time. ”
“It’s so pretty I had to hang it up on my wall! ”
“This was the most DELIGHTFUL thing to find in my inbox! As a donor and volunteer (and all things between and beyond), this made me feel like I just got a big hug from Pride. ”
“This idea is truly inspired! Than you for the care package, I am loving the book and podcast recommendations alongside a recipe for a hot cheeto bowl—so, true comfort abounds. I appreciate you and your team. ”