The month of November marks Geile/Leon’s 25th year in business. 25 years. More than six presidential terms, over 100 space missions and “The Tonight Show” is on its third host. In that same time, G/L has worked with over 200 clients both locally and nationally. That’s 9,131 days, countless cups of coffee and late-nighters, and creating great work that has made a difference in our clients business and the brands they represent.

We live by our mantra, “Make It Mean Something“, but discovered that we’re not alone in embracing these four simple words. Numerous non-profit organizations across St. Louis selflessly donate their time, money and energy to make our community better.

So, to celebrate our 25 years and our mantra, each person at Geile/Leon highlighted and donated to a non-profit of their choice and shared their experience through #GLSTL25. Below sums up our #GLSTL25 efforts and the time/money/brainpower/items/etc. that we contributed to these organizations that share in our vision.

Cheers to 25 years and to many more!

The American Lung Association was founded in 1904. Their core mission is to save lives by improving lung health and preventing lung disease through education, advocacy and research. They provide support and resources to adults and children, as well as develop ways to maintain healthy indoor and outdoor air.

The American Lung Association of Missouri, located in South City on Hampton Ave., offers a variety of programs for people whose lives have been touched by lung disease. Some of the most popular programs include:

• Asthma Educator Institute
• Better Breathers Club
• Freedom from Smoking
• Freedom from Smoking Facilitator Training
• Missouri Fights Lung Cancer
• Influenza
• Lung HelpLine

In their ongoing ‘Fight for Air’ effort, the American Lung Association of Missouri is always looking for supporters. There are multiple special events that take place throughout the year including the popular Asthma Walk or Master the Met. To discover volunteer opportunities, please submit an application here or call 314-645-5505.

To keep up on all the happenings of the American Lung Association of Missouri, you can follow them on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube – or sign up for their enewsletter.

I chose the ALA because I suffer from asthma, and I wanted to support my daughter and her friends when they “Mastered the Met.” In honor of #GLSTL25, I donated $25 to my daughter’s participation in her event.

As part of Geile/Leon’s #GLSTL25 campaign, we’ve been highlighting and offering support to various non-profits in St. Louis that make a difference in our community. But there’s one organization that’s been doing just that since 2009.

ready+willing (a 501(c)3 public charity itself) was established by Sarah Waters and Kendra Gilligan as an organization for advertising, marketing and public relations professionals to help other non-profits in the area by providing pro bono marketing and advertising services. Assistance is made possible by assembling teams of industry professionals to participate in mentorship and collaboration opportunities. As they plan, concept and produce communications pieces for organizations in need, these individuals get the chance to work closely with people and projects from all over the St. Louis area.

Our mission is to enrich, provide, impact, promote and empower St. Louis. Enrichment happens throughout our team projects program where we provide a forum for St. Louis advertising and marketing professionals to be connected to one another while we produce compelling marketing, advertising and public relations solutions to help other local area charities tell their story. Through telling their stories, we aim to impact the St. Louis community in a positive way, promote the city that we love so much and empower the people of St. Louis to collaborate as a community for the advancement of the community.
-Kendra Gilligan

Whether it’s through creative talent (written and visual), account services, production skills or leadership, ready+willing is always looking for new members and volunteers who would like to donate their time and skills to our community. With their continued growth, there is currently a strong need to hire a part time executive director, sponsors for their project process events, and volunteers for the board of director and committee positions.

If you’d like to contribute to ready+willing’s cause, you can contact Sarah Waters at [email protected] or 314-482-6438. To make a monetary donation or learn more about their list of needs, please visit www.readyandwilling.org/donate.

In my effort to support #GLSTL25, I’ll be committing at least 25 hours to the development of a more robust website, which will include more features and networking options for members on the site.

I never really considered myself an “animal person.” Sure, I had family dog growing up that I lovingly named after myself (what?), but it was just routine, part of daily life. I never thought about where she came from, how much we paid and certainly not what life would’ve been like if she had lived the life of a stray. Fast forward to 2011 when I stumbled across Gateway Pet Guardians. It is most fitting to say I was stopped in my tracks.

Gateway Pet Guardians is a nonprofit animal shelter whose passionate and dedicated staff and volunteers care for animals on the streets of East St. Louis and surrounding areas. Their mission is to end homelessness for animals in the Metro East through rescue, rehabilitation, adoption, community outreach and education.

While the organization became official in 2004, Gateway Pets began long before (in 1995) when one of the founders, PJ Hightower, took notice of the amount of strays in East St. Louis. Being an avid animal lover, she didn’t just shake her head and assume, “If only I could…” She simply did. And every consecutive day since 2001, PJ sets out before dawn with a Gateway volunteer, bags of food and dog bones in tow, to feed the strays on the streets.

The job description of veterinary jobs is not treating them alone. Sometimes, animals need that care and compassion to gel with humans properly. Gaining the trust of an animal is the most ecstatic feeling ever. From my first time sitting quietly in a kennel with a feral/shy dog to gain its trust to rolling around with multiple litters of puppies to spending time in the community, my experience has been incredible. The growth Gateway Pet Guardians has experienced in just the three short years I’ve been involved has been substantial and emotionally overwhelming. There are days when you’re elated because a 9-month shelter pup finds a home, and then there are those where you’re trying to choke back tears thinking about strays in below zero temperatures.

One of the many things Gateway Pets has done beautifully is craft an organization that welcomes volunteers of any interest or capacity. Volunteers can assist at the shelter, take a dog on a run, take part in an adoption event, get on the fundraising committee, transport pups to the spay/neuter clinic, join in community outreach days in East St. Louis or better yet, foster or adopt to keep the rescues up!

If I could challenge you to any one thing, it’d be to join me for a just a few hours one day to explore Gateway Pet Guardians. Their goal to end homelessness in animals in East St. Louis is attainable, and each individual volunteer makes that possible. Interested in checking it out? Please let me know!

As my effort to support #GLSTL25, I’ve committed to at least 25 outreach hours in East St. Louis because I’m a firm believe that knowledge is, in fact, power.

Each summer at G/L, we set aside three individual days and designate them “Fun Fridays.” It’s our opportunity to shut down a bit early and head out on an adventure to celebrate the upcoming holiday weekend. From an Anhueser-Busch tour to an afternoon at Stray Rescue, we take advantage of the weather and enjoy each other’s company. However, this past Fun Friday (or Thursday if we want to get technical), we decided to take a different approach to tradition.

In light of our 25^th anniversary and the ongoing #GLSTL25 campaign, we heeded the call of Children’s Home Society of Missouri – a non-profit recently featured on the blog by Tim. After some initial coordination between Tim and Leslie Tucker, the organization’s Director of Development, we determined they had multiple needs with which we could assist.

You see, Leslie is simply a phenomenal individual. As with many non-profits, she wears many hats and upon listening to her speak over lunch last Thursday, we knew we’d be able to tackle her PR and marketing needs, alleviate some of her challenges and help support an incredible cause.

So, we broke into teams and set out on a three-hour mission. In that short time frame, we were able to plow through multiple positioning statements, taglines, a news advisory, future PR initiatives, a digital strategy, plus an eblast template, newsletter, brochure layout, annual report layout and fact sheet.

As an agency, we’re accustomed to the routine of concepts, revisions, presentations, etc. that span over weeks and sometimes months. To shut down typical daily distractions and collaborate to deliver an integrated campaign in one afternoon was really amazing. But I can speak for the team at G/L when I say that it was so rewarding to see the difference we could make for an organization like CHS, which provides a valuable service to our community and is unlike any other. The effort of their staff, volunteers and donors is selfless. And more importantly, they provide these services to the most vulnerable – our children.

While we know we are such a small piece of the puzzle, knowing that we can use our talents for something so beneficial is humbling. We look forward to presenting our work to CHS this week!