GRAMMY-winning hip-hop artist Lupe Fiasco had a long history of philanthropic work, from songs linked to charitable causes to his own mission of providing warm meals and coats to Chicago families in need. As these efforts expanded to include music education, curriculum and a host of other arts-based initiatives in Chicago inner-city communities, he and co-founder Ayesha Jaco realized they needed to formally organize and expand this outreach. In 2009, the Lupe Fiasco Foundation was born, but by 2014 its reach was great enough to require a more succinct message platform as well as a website.
While the Foundation had a collection of ad-hoc marketing materials, there was no standardized language to describe what the Foundation was or what it did. Our first order of business was auditing these existing materials and crafting a custom survey to help the board members and internal team drill down on the Foundation’s core mission, its main initiatives and how its programs and activities were organized within this structure. Next, we worked with the team to develop website architecture based on this messaging and to translate early versions of the logo into a look and feel for the new site.
The proposed new messaging was embraced whole-heartedly by the Foundation team and continues to be implemented across marketing materials. Ultimately, we built and launched a website that provided fans three ways to get involved, including a form for volunteers, one for students to apply for multidisciplinary arts grants, and a donation platform linked to a custom “donor wall” to honor the Foundation’s contributors.
Visit lupefiascofoundation.org
