Inspira Marketing: Big Ideas to Big Impact
By Jeff Snyder, Founder & CEO
I spent the first two decades of my career at leading experiential marketing agencies and was growing increasingly frustrated by what I saw. Agencies were drowning in a sea of sameness with no clear differentiator in terms of products and service and there was a growing emphasis on the bottom line. Consequently, this was having an adverse effect on both the quality of work and employee morale. I believed I could do better.
I envisioned a different kind of agency - one built upon relationships and doing the right thing, where people come before profits, where the team was passionate about the work they were doing (and had fun doing it!), and optimism, innovation, and excellence ruled.
But my vision had to be put on hold. At the time, my then-two-year-old daughter, Kennedy, had just been diagnosed with a rare form of spinal cancer and I was conscious of the consequences of losing health insurance and a guaranteed income at a critical time. But, as she faced this life-threatening illness and rounds of chemotherapy treatments, I was in awe of her ability to approach any obstacle with optimism and tenacity. Her unwavering spirit inspired me to launch Inspira in 2008.
Most companies are lucky to have a clear mission, let alone a reason for being. With Kennedy as my inspiration, I placed living and working with passion and purpose at the heart of Inspira’s philosophy. More important, I put my ideals into action by donating a portion of our profits to childhood cancer research and committing to providing ongoing pro bono marketing and creative work for Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation for Childhood Cancer (ALSF).
I believed that when people are driven by a higher purpose, it would lay the foundation for a more successful business and create an ecosystem fueled by passion and innovation. In turn, Inspira’s unique purpose-driven culture would attract amazingly talented people who would thrive in our community, produce extraordinary work for our clients, and inspire people to take action. And you know what...it worked.
A decade later, Inspira is thriving. Today, we employ over 450 of, arguably, the best and brightest talent in the business with offices in Connecticut, New York City, and Chicago. Our client roster includes some of the world’s most recognizable brands - many of whom have been with us since the beginning, and we are consistently recognized among the Top Places to Work. I attribute our success to our culture of putting people, passion, and purpose foremost in what we do and how we do it - for our business, for our clients, and in the lives of the people we touch through our activations.
Through our purpose-driven culture, Inspira has helped raise well over $1 million for pediatric cancer research through Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation and our team actively participates marquee events including ALEX’S Million Mile, the Chance for Life poker tournament, and Lemon:NYC.
What started with ALSF has taken on a life of its own. Although as a company we remain committed to ASLF, our commitment to creating an environment where people find purpose in their work has empowered our employees to take ownership of the company’s culture and bring it to places I never expected.
Nowhere is this more evident than our annual “Big Idea” project. Each year, our employees are divided into teams and each team selects a local charity of their choice and collaborates to create an experiential program that they believe will have an overwhelmingly positive impact on the community. In “Shark Tank” fashion, each team presents its “Big Idea” to leadership where two ideas are selected and put to a company-wide vote. The winning idea is then underwritten by Inspira and wholly executed by the entire company. Our team pours its collective knowledge, experience, and expertise into these events. And it’s not just limited to our current staff. Clients, and even former employees, come out to donate their time on a weekend to make a difference. Whether it’s a day of giving, festively decorating the hospital rooms of sick children, coordinating a 4-LEGGED 4K to raise funds for a local animal shelter, or handing out backpacks filled with school supplies to children in underserved communities, the spirit of giving is woven into everything that we do. It’s who we are. This is what I’m most proud of.
Our commitment to creating an environment where people find purpose in their work has fueled a unique culture which allows employees to pursue their own passions and feel fulfilled in a way that far exceeds the value of their paycheck. And the most glowing endorsement of all? People from outside of Inspira want to be a part of our culture, too, as evidenced by the constant flow of emails in my inbox from people dissatisfied with their current jobs and wanting to be a part of something bigger.