Operation FINALLY HOME is a national nonprofit that builds custom, mortgage-free homes for wounded, ill or injured American veterans and their families. For our “A Weight Off Their Shoulders” campaign celebrating the organization’s 10th anniversary, we partnered with Sword & Plough (a retail company that works with veterans to make bags out of military surplus materials) on special “give-back” backpacks to benefit Operation FINALLY HOME and used them as a hook for national publicity.

GS&F designed backpack collateral, website assets, social media campaign materials and a newsletter supporting the campaign, which kicked off on Veterans Day 2015.

The campaign produced more than 203 million impressions in 23 placements across print, online and broadcast outlets, including Fox & Friends, MSNBC, Southern Living magazine, key local media markets and more.

In the campaign’s first week, Operation FINALLY HOME’s Facebook and Twitter channels had nearly 88,000 impressions—a 67% increase over the week before. The organization sold all the backpacks in just four days and brought in direct donations to raise a total of approximately $175,000 for the organization. That’s the equivalent of two homes built for veterans. There was also a donation of $60,000 in home goods.

The campaign won four Parthenon Awards from the Public Relations Society of America, along with an award in the 2016 Bulldog Media Relations Awards.