On The Streets
We have never given up on the old fashioned way of meeting new people and starting new conversations about the things we all care about. That means hitting the streets and our rule is we never design anything we aren't happy to do right alongside you and your team. When TSP helps to design community campaigns, we recommend that the campaign have 3 intertwined elements, each of which reinforces the other:
A Street Campaign Strategy rooted in a compelling "invitation" and a truthful, provocative question(s) that helps people right then and there to invent solutions and feel a part of a growing movement. To do this we need to go to where people are at and offer a fair value proposition..
"A T-shirt for a 5 minute convo about quality of life on your street?"
A Regular Mixing and Connecting Space, which we refer to as t a Network Night or Neighbor Night, where the folks that we meet can meet each other, share food, fun and conversation and form small action teams.
A Grass Roots Investment Strategy of "pitch contest" or other catalyzing value proposition to stimulate and reward entrepreneurial spirit among residents and to surface the great ideas that are circulating in the community already.
Rise Up Network, Birmingham AL
We are blessed to work with a wonderful colleague Marshall Pollard through his work at the ED Foundation in Birmingham and more recently as CEO of Stay DRMN and Executive Director The Creative School in Washington DC. With Marshall and his team in Birmingham we designed a campaign that ultimately recruited over 1000 people into the Rise Up Network and included one of our most exciting and impactful Network Night ever!
No Cash Bail Campaign, Alamance County, NC
Bill and Frankie are very involved in their home town of Saxapahaw in Alamance County, NC. Currently, Frankie is on a team of neighbors and college students working in our home community of Alamance County, NC to secure the creation of a public defender’s office and to eliminate cash bail for non-violent misdemeanors. The team is on a steady pathway to educate others – door by door – and to invite those interested to join in their network and campaign.
St. Johnsbury Community HUB, Northeast Kingdom
The folks who started the The St. Johnsbury Community HUB knew from the start that while it's great to have a home base HUB that everyone wants to visit, in rural America you have to bring the HUB to where people. Each summer for the last 2 years the HUB has gone on the road, bringing NeighborUP Nights and the NeighborUP Pitch contest to rural towns throughout the Northeast Kingdom.
