Put simply, this campaign was entirely driven by design. The core of our idea took place in the most important element of a brand’s visual identity - its logo. So in our execution, the logos of other brands became the medium for our idea to come to life. Or in other words, the success of this campaign depended entirely on the development of a platform that was enticing enough for brands to want to use it for themselves, and a graphic system flexible enough for any brand to be able to give it life next to their logo.

This campaign wasn’t for consumers, it was for brands. Effectively, B2B. So the suite of creative assets we made for this campaign weren’t available for purchase, but they were available for download by interested brands that wanted to join our movement. In fact, it was critical to our idea that they did. So no, purchase was not necessary, but participation very much was. Or as we like to think of it, theft was very much encouraged. Unusual in the B2B world where IP is so heavily protected, to say the least.

Labor Day was created to celebrate trade workers’ critical contribution to America’s Industrial Revolution. But over the last 100+ years we’ve been celebrating, things have changed. We care about “smart” work now, not hard work. And Labor Day’s meaning has gotten lost in the process.

Today, we celebrate Labor Day for the sales…and long weekends…and last hoorahs before back-to-school. Basically everything EXCEPT trades workers. On the one day every year they’re supposed to be invaluable, they’re invisible. And to a brand like Red Wing Shoes that literally wouldn’t exist without trades workers; that has been serving trades workers for the last 115+ years before Labor Day even EXISTED…it’s not right.

So rather than cash in on all of the sales like other Labor Day loving brands, we decided to double-down on honoring the trades workers that build our world instead. The result was a campaign designed from the ground up to make trades workers impossible to overlook on the day they deserve it the most.

And a critical component of making that happen was a symbol that every American knows well: the trademark superscript ™. We’ll get to how it was crucial to our idea in a bit, but what’s important for you to know is that the trademark symbol appears on virtually any product advertised & sold in the US, and is first and foremost a tool for businesses to distinguish their unique products from others. The fact that it appears everywhere, on almost everything - was just what

Everything is made by trades, but because the trades are everywhere - they’re nowhere. Invisible to the everyday eye. Even on a day like Labor Day, a day that was made to celebrate the trades is now celebrated for sales instead. And given trades workers are already one of the most overlooked and underappreciated makers of, well, everything (literally) - our job was to ensure THIS Labor Day didn’t pass without loudly getting them the respect & recognition they deserved. The perfect objective for a brand like Red Wing Shoes that’s spent over a century working to open people’s eyes to the impact trades workers have on our world. And also why our core KPI was a simple one: Reach / open as many eyes as possible for the spend we had - with a minimum goal of 500MM impressions.

For 115+ years, Red Wing Shoes has made…shoes. And most people know trades workers make shoes. Just like most people know trades workers make buildings, bridges, and homes. But what most people forget, is that trades workers also make planes, phones, TVs, this computer. You get it. They’re everywhere, yet we overlook them like they’re nowhere. So we decided to take a symbol that appears everywhere ™ and turn it into a symbol for how trades workers have a hand in everything. Instead of standing for trademark, ™ became our “Trades-Made” mark a tangible reminder that behind every product, there’s a tradesperson who made it. But to really make the point that EVERYTHING is trades-made, we needed other brands to do the same. So we designed our campaign to be open-source from the start, and invited other companies to become “Trades-Made” brands over Labor Day Weekend. Amazingly, 32 brands did.

Red Wing’s caliber of quality is iconic, so our design standards were high. But we also needed to maintain the kind of neutrality and simplicity any brand could adopt, while also making the access & implementation of all open-source “Trades-Made” materials as intuitive as possible.

So the “Trades-Made” mark was designed using Helvetica Neue Medium and was applicable in any color - suitable for any brands that wanted to join the initiative. The vector files were made available for download, along with a guideline with straight parameters for sizing and positioning, demonstrating how to place the symbol next to a logo.

We also provided unbranded “Trades-Made” labels that could be printed and attached to any physical product, and the After Effects file containing our film was built to make it easy for any brand to swap the end logo and render a new video with their logo and Trades-Made mark.

Our goal was to reach/open as many eyes as possible to the impact that trades workers make on our world for the spend we had - with a minimum of 500MM impressions. Not only did we hit it, the final tally of +755MM impressions was more than 150% of our original target. And while it wasn’t the goal, Red Wing’s sales website traffic increased 87% post-launch. But more than anything, what made this work meaningful to the trades workers we celebrated and the people whose eyes we wanted to open, wasn’t us touting our trades-made products. It was the other brands people didn’t expect touting THEIR “Trades-Made” marks. It was the fact that “Trades-Made” was physically mounted on buildings, and projected onto monuments, and tagged onto products. Alone, our “Trades-Made” mark would easily go unnoticed. But together, it was impossible to overlook how much tradespeople touch our world.