Production company Preen works with Media Trust to support mental health charity and young creator trainees

Paving the way for the next generation of creatives is something very close to our hearts here at Preen, and we’ve most recently been able to do this through our partnership with Media Trust. Like Media Trust, we believe in the power of the media to change lives and want to ensure we play our part as creative professionals to give marginalised groups a stronger voice.

Our workshop, the Charity Challenge Day, centred around interpreting a live brief from a charity who would otherwise normally not have the budget and resources to focus on creative comms in this way. We worked closely with the fantastic Carly and Simone, and their colleagues in the wider Media Trust team, to find and identify a charity we could support with our capacity, resources, and skills.

The stars aligned and we connected with mental health service Men’s Minds Matter. Men’s Minds Matter is a non-profit dedicated to the prevention of male suicide by building psychological resilience and emotional strength. The team from MMM; Luke and Nigel, were wonderful to work with. It was incredible to see the impact that could be made when they came together to collaborate with the talented Creativity Works Futures trainees. This was an extremely sensitive subject matter and, alongside the team at Media Trust, we fostered a safe and sensitive working environment and ensured everybody involved knew they could step back and take time whenever they might need to.

Leading up to the session we worked with MMM on their brief, to really refine what their objectives were. The brief asked for creative ideas that would highlight the work that Men’s Minds Matter do, encourage people to donate to their cause and highlight the importance of awareness of men’s mental health. After a virtual meet with the young trainees, we then met in person on the day of the workshop. The trainees were split into four teams, each team came up with their own agency name. The agencies were ‘Instinct’, ‘Maze’, ‘Straight Up Maze’ (or SUM for short), and ‘Utopia’. After the workshop, all four teams worked independently, using a WhatsApp group to communicate with workshop leaders, Preen MD Kevin Tewis-Allen and Preen Creative Director Jez Furlong.

The four teams then each pitched their campaign ideas to Preen and the team at Men’s Minds Matter. There were some brilliant ideas, based on really strong insight. One concept that really stood out was the fact that the majority of men receive their first bunch of flowers at their funeral. It asked the question, could we use flowers to better appreciate and celebrate the men in our lives?

Despite four strong teams, there could only be one winner, which was MAZE.

Maze’s winning idea saw the young people calling up their male friends simply to tell them how much they love them and capturing the moment on film. This really championed the importance of and difference that ‘checking in’ can make.

In fact, we were so impressed with their concept that Preen will be helping create and bring their video to life. One of our producers, Cortney Stowers, has been dedicated to support the team, to help them with the logistics of the shoot and ensure they get the full potential out of Preen’s support, with studios, equipment, and crew. Jez Furlong, Preen’s Creative Director, will be navigating the creative process with the team to ensure it continues to capture the powerful sentiment the team created in their pitch film.

Being a part of the Creativity Works Futures programme was such an exciting experience for the team at Preen. The opportunity to lend our expertise and guidance not just to a life-changing charity like Men’s Minds Matter, but also to such superb underrepresented young talent, has been truly special. Not only do we feel like we’ve helped make a difference to them, but they’ve certainly taught us a lot and helped make a difference to our own insights and way of working.

We’re actually hoping to bring some of the trainees on-board to work with us in various capacities and are looking forward to partnering more with Media Trust throughout 2022 and beyond. Most recently, we’ve brought the wonderful Tiana Baptiste onboard three days a week, paid, working in our creative coworking space as well as getting her involved in marketing, production, and postproduction.

To any media or creative agency thinking about lending their support and getting involved, we couldn’t recommend it enough!