Brianna Graves

Operations Manager, Editor

IHAVEANIDEA

There are many reasons why IHAVEANIDEA is proud to partner with the VCU Brandcenter. But why are we beaming with extra pride these days?

Since 2006, the Brandcenter competed in the Innovation Challenge four times. The first time the VCU team went into battle, they came in 20th, the second time 15th, the third time they jumped up to second place and this year?

Well, this year they were deemed “the most innovative business school in the world.”

That’s right. The Brandcenter’s “Team Brandslam,” comprising Team Leader Jennifer Clinehens, Art Director Cody Pate, Copywriter Katlyn Williams and Creative Technologist Ryan Dowling won the 9th Annual Innovation Challenge, besting 185 other teams. They were up against the world’s most prestigious business schools, including UVA, London School of Business, Harvard, Wharton, Notre Dame and more.

The Innovation Challenge is a well-established international business innovation competition that matches graduate and Masters students with leading brands, charging each team to find solutions to current business and social challenges. For the first time this year, the competition was held entirely online.

All first-year VCU Brandcenter students participate in the Innovation Challenge as part of Professor Don Just’s Business of Branding class. “Team Brandslam” brought varying levels of expertise to the competition; Pate and Williams came straight to the Brandcenter from undergraduate students, while Dowling worked as a graphic designer before beginning grad school.

“Team Brandslam “worked with AT&T in the “Strategy/Business Model” category, helping the brand develop a product that used cloud computing, specifically for small and medium-sized businesses.

The method to their brilliance?

“We stayed true to our unique voice, and abided by Lee Clow’s saying, ‘If you wish to outsmart, out simplify,’” Clinehens said, “With every image, message, and word we chose, we did so knowing that our point of view was different from the MBA programs. We positioned ourselves as different from the typical MBA presentation in every way, and it was a gamble that thankfully paid off.”

The effort involved intensive quantitative and qualitative research, talking to potential consumers and developing strategies based on key consumer and marketplace insights.

“This win serves to validate the Brandcenter’s focus on developing unexpected consumer insights and then using those insights to craft imaginative strategies that enhance the market power of brands. Here a great deal of energy is expended searching for big, business-building ideas, innovative ideas that resonate with today’s consumers, building brand equity. There is no better example of this approach at work than the winning effort of our Innovation Challenge teams,” Just said.

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Liz Butterfield
Contributing Writer

Commonwealth Times

Last Friday at 3:59 p.m., four VCU Brandcenter students poised themselves to ring the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange.

The team of graduate advertising  students won the title of “The World’s Most Innovative MBAs” and $20,000 at last week’s ninth annual Innovation Challenge.

The four-person team was first-year Brandcenter graduate students Jennifer Clinehens, Ryan Dowling, Katlyn Williams and Cody Pate. None of the team members are actually MBA students.

The team was awarded the lump sum to split evenly between them. In addition to reducing student loans and credit-card debt with their winnings, the team said they plan on throwing a small celebration at the Brandcenter in honor of all students who competed at the challenge. Two other VCU teams placed in their category at the challenge.

The win comes as a pleasant surprise to team leader Clinehens, who said she attributes the win to hard work and a good program.

“I think that’s just a testament to Brandcenter and VCU and this whole unique interdisciplinary program, and … the value of hard work,” she said.

The team designed a solution that would increase efficiency and reduce costs for small businesses using cloud platforms for sponsor AT&T Inc.

No major details of the project are released, as AT&T Inc. can use their idea commercially.

The team, called “Brandslam,” beat out 185 teams in the challenge, including teams from Yale, Standford, Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania.

 

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 RVA NEWS

A team of VCU students have won the 9th Annual Innovation Challenge, a competition among graduate students from universities all over the world to find solutions to pressing business and social innovation challenges. They competed against teams from graduate schools such as Harvard, Dartmouth, and UC Berkeley in the final round of AT&T division competition.

Students at the VCU Brandcenter, one of the top advertising programs in the country, developed a successful cloud-based platform solution for small businesses. “After interviewing a handful of small business owners, we quickly learned that many didn’t understand the full value that cloud services could provide,” said the VCU team spokesperson Jennifer Clinehens in a press release, a creative brand management student at VCU Brandcenter.

The VCU team came up with a tool that small business owners could use to simplify cloud and mobile applications to increase productivity and efficiency, all the while providing these small businesses with the “analytical firepower” typically harnessed by larger companies, all for a fraction of the typical costs.

The VCU team, which consists of an art director, copywriter, creative technologist, and creative brand manager, will share in a $20,000 grand prize. They will also ring the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange later this afternoon.

“We’re always looking for opportunities to encourage new, innovative technology solutions and thrive on the creativity provided by graduate students,” said Sam Zellner, AT&T’s Executive Director of Innovation. “The VCU team’s innovative approach to simplifying adoption of cloud computing for small businesses has a lot of potential and we’re thrilled to have been a collaborator in their winning submission.”

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Rick Boyko Shares Insights in Letter to Next Director of the VCU Brandcenter

ADVERTISING AGE

Over the past eight years it is has been my privilege and pleasure to have taught and learned from the over 700 VCU Brandcenter students who have graduated and gone on to work at just about every agency in the world including, Wieden & Kennedy, TBWA/Chiat/Day, Goodby Silverstein & Partners, CP&B, Martin Agency and Droga 5, as well as with marketers like Target, Audi, Nike, Anthropologie, Lego, Google and Microsoft.

During my tenure, each class of students has demonstrated they expect and want to be challenged by someone who will instill in them a passion and caring for our craft. I've also witnessed a movement by them as they have transitioned from doing ads to having a distinct interest in solving marketing problems by bringing a brand story to life in new ways, which adds meaning and value to a greater good. One good example of this is our recent Still4Japan web, PR and social-media campaign, which will urge people to remember the tsunami victims.

This is why our curriculum has changed six times over the past eight years and why it has to continue to change and evolve to meet with their desire to do things differently. As we begin our search for the next director of the VCU Brandcenter, here are a few thoughts on what he or she can expect and look forward to in helping fuel the industry with the next generation of talent.

 

• First and foremost, the students are constantly curious so you can expect them to demand the same of you.

   

• You can expect them to challenge and question everything. They will not do things the way they've always been done.

   

• They are digital natives. You can expect them to infuse digital thinking and strategy into any problem they are given, making it necessary for those above them to better understand the digital landscape as well.

   

• Expect them to want to affect change and therefore try to solve social issues around sustainability and creating a better life by asking the brands they work for to do the same.

   

• Expect their interests to include all aspects of branding from product design, package design, in-store display and content development, making companies like Ideo, Redscout and What If? places of interest to them.

   

• You can expect them to have a strong entrepreneurial spirit and a desire to create their own intellectual property, challenging the school and the companies that hire them to infuse engineering into their thinking and understanding.

   

• Finally, being around the students, you can expect to be inspired and reinvigorated about the possibilities that this business offers, ensuring that whoever takes on this position will find it the most rewarding job they will ever have.

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