Every 44 Seconds
Project 44's 10-year story, with MIWI Marketing

The problem

Project 44 exists because of Andrew Smith, the Butler basketball player who, after two Final Four runs and two cancer relapses, spent what he had left trying to get more people onto the bone marrow registry. Andrew is gone. His mission isn't.

Ten years in, that mission had become a lot of things at once: a fundraising drive, a fight for legislation, a push to make Indiana the country's leading state for donors, and above all a story about real people whose lives turned on whether a stranger signed up. Our job was to hold all of that in one film without losing the person at the center of it. Get it wrong and it's a highlight reel. Get it right and someone joins the registry and saves a life they'll never meet.

What we did

We embedded with the team and built the story with them, not just for them. That included sitting shoulder to shoulder in the edit with Krissi, shaping how each person's story opened and closed.

We balanced the two halves the film needed: the tactical (a decade of partnerships, legislation, Indiana's leadership on the issue) and the human (the survivors, Andrew's widow, and Deegan, the first match, alive because one person joined the registry). One carries the mission's credibility. The other is why anyone cares.

Then we made it travel. From the one engagement we built a full system: the impact film, campaign videos, more than twenty social cuts, vertical versions, and the anniversary ceremony captured live at Hinkle. So the story didn't run once and disappear. It reached people everywhere Project 44 needed to be.

The result

The campaign surpassed its fundraising goal. The film gave Project 44 a piece it could put in front of donors, partners, and legislators, and a library of content to carry the message across every sport and channel it works in. The bigger result is quieter: it's a partnership that keeps going, because the work keeps earning the next project.

"Each time we partner with Mark, I'm impressed by his preparedness, creative genius, and ability to put everyone at ease. He is an invaluable extension of the MIWI team, and a pure joy to work with."
— Krissi Edgington, President, MIWI Marketing