Three of the first Mack Medium Duty Class 6 and Class 7 trucks make their debut in downtown Winston Salem.
Why Winston Salem you may ask? For starters, it is less than 2 hours from the new assembly plant in Salem, Virginia. It is thirty minutes west of our offices at Mack World Headquarters in Greensboro. Lastly, it is our latest yet very important new product launch shoot planned, executed, and produced by us, the Mack marketing team.
After some touch and go on the scheduling of truck availability, we landed on the week in which we would execute our photo and video shoot. Prior to I reached out to a lifelong friend who owns a landscaping business, Elite Landscaping and asked if he would be up for participating. We would logo up the truck with his company logo and put it to work for the morning while I captured still photography and Urmos ran and directed video. We later hung Mark from the back of a Chrysler Pacifica with a camera for on the road still photography. Mark and I try to tag-team the photography… getting all we can when we can.
A co-worker has a relationship with Wiseman Brewery located in downtown Winston Salem so we set them up for truck number two day two.
For truck three and day three we had our local agency Vela who we hired to help run logistics, reach out to a fun and unique company located in Tobaccoville called Nomad Farms. We also shot with Carolina Wood Floors and Hoots Brewery to show additional versatility with the trucks.
Mack Medium Duty Monday
Monday morning we set off to make Mack history. One of the first new Class 7 Mack Medium Duty trucks reports for just that… duty. We rolled onto the grounds at Elite Landscaping before sunrise ready to leave our own personal creative mark on this iconic Mack brand.
Another reward of this shoot was that we reunited with our video crew from Roadlife who lent a hand with the crane cam, audio, and some in-cab video capture. It is always great to see those guys and we all pick up right where we left off months back departing from nearly two years on the road together filming.
For those who do not realize what running logistics can entail on an on-road video shoot, I want to give a shout out to Vela for a great job in helping us turn it around over the course of three and half days. Here is a shortlist of what it takes:
- Finding our third company to participate in the shoot.
- Get logo artwork from three companies and have them printed and arrange graphic installation.
- Arrange a driver to take trucks for graphic installation and removal.
- Secure any needed roadway permits.
- Hire a police officer for blocking traffic and escorting the action.
- Talent releases and use of likeness.
- Bring in coffee, lunch, and snacks for three days of shooting.
From here it started rolling like clockwork. We actually ended up getting what we needed at Elite Landscaping half a day early and left Pfafftown for Tobaccoville. It was a logistical masterpiece if you are familiar with the area.
Nomad Farms
Nomad Farms is a wonderful farm located in Tobaccoville, North Carolina. Known for raising farm to table grass-fed livestock and poultry. What is more amazing is they sell it on the honor system. You simply drive up, take what you need, write your order down and receive the bill. It is quite unique and trusting none the less.
A Wiseman Drives a Mack
You guessed it, we started day two in downtown Winston Salem. I can not take credit for the headline… my co-worker coined that one the day of the shoot at Wiseman. Wiseman is a great brewery that is starting to really grow into needing a new Mack Medium Duty to haul kegs of fresh beer to and from their storage facility. The venue looks awesome and made for a great location for early morning photos.
By lunch, we had the black Mack which we shot at Elite Landscaping refreshed with the Hoot’s Brewery logo back in town. We spent the midday shooting it and as the sun began to set, we ventured back to Wiseman to make several runs through downtown Winston Salem shooting video and photography.
We wrapped up Wednesday evening late. Proving yet again that a small productive in-house marketing team can make a lot happen in a short amount of time. I think we walked away with nearly 3,000 images of which you see appear in our launch ad below as well as our website, social media, and many other places.
Built for Growth
Our agency Office of Experience in Chicago did a fantastic job with the ad layout and our Built for Growth message. We chose Built for Growth as it speaks to the small business owner, the entrepreneur who is working each day growing his or her own business. Here we are saying that Mack Medium Duty is built to grow with them.
And for the pleasure of seeing it all come together… Mark Urmos did a great job at editing and producing the final launch video. All in three days of work.
