Episode Transcript
[00:00:07] Speaker A: Well, hello there. This is Philip Clark. And welcome back to another just say something weekly podcast. We're happy to have you with us today.
If you need to find out more about us or anything that we do, be sure to check out just saysomethingsc.org. and there you can find all of our programs.
So today we're going to talk about a new initiative that you may or may not have heard that we are involved in. But with this, we have our partners, and I'm talking about the power collective. And if you want to check that out, you can go to powercollectivesc.com, and you will see in our, with our partners rise prevention Mental Health America, Greenville County, Nami, Greenville, South Carolina, and 988 and Unity Health on Maine, along with Greenville County Sheriff's Office, have come together to work on raising awareness of resources, removing the stigma, doing more education and prevention around the opioid issue that our community, not just our community in Greenville, not just in South Carolina, but across the country.
And so collectively, we are the power collective. And so part of where that came from.
The power collective is our guest today, and his name is Gino Church. A little bit. Well, I can't tell you all about him, but I can tell you that Gino has been with this organization. Just say something before we were. Just say something before we were Greenville family partnership. Gino and crew came, have been involved with us one shape, form or fashion since we were Greenville families in action back in the late eighties.
And so fast forward to where we are today, 2024. Just say something that makes you think that, Nichina, it's a whole career.
[00:02:37] Speaker B: Yeah, I was just thinking, I. I think I first got started and met you and Carol before. I had, um, silver hair. I think it was still brown back.
[00:02:48] Speaker A: Then, so it was long and curly back then, too.
[00:02:51] Speaker B: It was, yeah. I wish I could grow it out like that again.
[00:02:56] Speaker A: Well, I wish I had more hair. So there. So, Gino, you have such a rich history, not with just this organization, but also with the topics that we deal with when it comes to substance use, tobacco, vaping, opioids, alcohol, just the whole vast of your creative experience and research and things that you've done globally all over the world.
I feel we're very, very fortunate to be able to have you still working with us. And from the onset, just know that we're very, very, very appreciative of everything that you do for us, because there would be no way that we could afford to pay what you would charge a client. But I know we're. We're more than a client, and it all goes back to relationships.
So as we think about, or as you were thinking about power collective for this particular project, tell me and our listeners some of your thought processes of where that came from and how you developed that.
[00:04:17] Speaker B: You know what I guess, Phil, it comes from, well, my whole experience of kind of going down this path of working in prevention and awareness and goes back to, you know, this organization and its roots of when I was, you know, first met Carol and I, and she needed help with the national Red Ribbon campaign. And I will admit I didn't know really a thing about prevention and awareness. And I was just not too long out of school, so I just started approaching it as you would is okay, they need a design, so I've got to come up with the design. But I quickly discovered because of the first trip that I made, I think, was to Little Rock, Arkansas, to meet some of the board members of Red Ribbon with Carol, is that all these parents that were sitting around the table, they were facing this crisis personally and the power that they had around that table.
What hit me was it was far greater than anything that I could create with my wrist or with my brain, so to speak. And so as I got chances, like working with GFP, Greenwood family Partnership. But it became next. And working with youth programs, which led directly into working with the state of South Carolina and DHAC Department of Health Environmental Control to build rage against the haze which came out of the tobacco settlement was it all came down to what I learned in those early days of working with GFPs behalf at a national level. And that was that you need to think less about the outcome of your design or your creative work and more of how it can empower people to take the lead and run with it, and in a way, become living messengers for that. So what I try to do is look at that. It's in case of power collective, he first had to come up with a name that felt like something that all these different constituents could, like, be a part of. And so power was a word out there. We just kind of shaped it in the power collective. And then from that identity, it came out for me was to think about something that is symbolic, that wouldn't necessarily represent a collective or an organization. So it kind of feels like it's, you know, businessy, but it would be more symbolic of an icon or an element that people would want to wear and be a part of, you know, something that could show unity, strength, passion, hope, all the things that, that really you know, that really come in. We've been beaten down so much the, through the years, when you look at drug prevention, marketing and advertising, you think back of, you know, this is your brain on drugs and the frying pan. And then you had truth that did, you know, they shifted it when the body bags. And then when we did rage, we did little, very little traditional marketing. We did more what you would call, I guess, viral or guerrilla marketing. We empowered teens to go out and through their daily lives, talk about the choice to smoke or not. And that was a great influence on me in the way that I think. So with power collective, it was, you know, how do we create a. A symbol and a meaning that can be adaptive and meaningful to a wide variety of people and for a wide variety of uses? Because when we, you know, the problem is when you develop an identity in the beginning, you really don't know how you're going to use it. And that's us. Yeah. As you started supervising and managing this with the partners, your needs have grown in where you need to know to where. Now it's kind of gone from this little, small cluster, not small, but upstate initiative to where you're looking at a statewide initiative. So how do you develop an identity that is personable, that's almost like a torch that everyone can carry? So that's what my thinking was.
[00:08:49] Speaker A: And also I think it's something already in its. I guess it's still in its infancy, is already being recognized.
[00:08:58] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:09:00] Speaker A: Especially as some of the work that we're doing as part of the collective has spread across the state.
I know that's one of the things that we realized right away. Well, one was we were missing the mental health piece, and so we brought that in. And I. I feel like you've. In the design of the particular logo you have for power collective. It's a.
I want to say a swoop or it's the Nike swoop. For us, it's. It's a flame or it shows power.
[00:09:42] Speaker B: Yeah, well, you know, when we first started playing with logos, you know, we were, you know, we want to start sharing with you. And we were kind of trying to get a collective viewpoint on it. We were kind of thinking about flame, lightning bolts, something that, you know, obviously signified power, you know, just to some extent as a symbol. But then, you know, how can we create something that, you know, that a lot of, you know, in some ways, you. I think you want something that people can see what they want to see in it. And so, you know, that's kind of a challenge. But it also goes to which a person I used to work with, who is actually a neuroscientist, said that a logo and a brand, it really is just a design until people put stories around it. And so that's what we have in our infancy. As you start building this out, it's going to get more powerful as more stories wrap around it, because that's its true value. That's what it really stands for. Like the tenants of what power collective is. If it's about, you know, education, locking, pill bottles, mental health, you know, all these different things that are the tenants, the, in a way, the three legged stool that supports it. And so then that's how you start building stories around it that give that identity real value. Just like why we might love the target logo. I mean, it's just a red bullseye. But if you're a target fan, it means something one way, just like Publix's logo. It's a really simple, clean logo, a circle P. But for people that are fans, it says something about them. And so that's what we wanted to do with power collective. We wanted to give folks that fit into, you know, anytime you start talking about prevention, you know, this far greater than me, you face stereotypes 100%. You face judgment, you know, all kinds of things that, frankly, are just, you know, not true. And it shows a lack of empathy and understanding. You know, when you believe that certain things like this are just morality issues over a lot of things related to brain chemistry, people self prescribing because they feel terrible, I mean, that's what you and I know. We've gone through the research and the training from DEA and so forth, right? And so we've learned these things. So, you know, what you try to do is put something out there, like you said, that constitutes a symbol of power, hope.
Like you said, the flame, the bolt. So it's got a little bit of a charge in it with some things that work in it that I hope people see, and that becomes something they see in it.
[00:12:37] Speaker A: Right, right. And I know as we experience growth already, we're already talking about a much more robust website and things along that line. So I'm excited about the future. But right now, in the present, here and now, a lot of our discussions have been all right, so we have this power collective.
Our power is in getting out to the community to share, because one of the things that we really want to do is reduce stigma, whether it's substance use, whether it's mental health, they all go hand in hand. And so that's one of the biggest things, is denial or stigma. And so I know we've been talking about different avenues of getting the message out there more. Can you tell our listeners some of the thoughts? And then we can kind of go into some of the things that we already have on the books that we're going to that I'm really excited about.
[00:13:48] Speaker B: Sure. I think, well, the, you know, the biggest challenge for you and a, you know, an initiative like this, of course, is budget. And you're, you're never, you're never going to have enough money to be able to allocate marketing dollars in a way that you could just do an awareness campaign and create impact. So you have to be smart about it and knowing that, you know, something like power collective. And if you are going to fight stigma, it's got to be done really more at the grassroots level instead of the grass at the top, at the treetop level.
[00:14:26] Speaker A: Right.
[00:14:27] Speaker B: So where, where can we go? You've got your, you've got a really wonderful supportive partner base from rise to the sheriff's department to other organizations there that have their own, you know, rivers, so to speak, that they dive into, you know, the, the other challenge of this is just like when we did rage, back when we started working with rage against the Hays and developing that program, there were other tobacco prevention organizations and initiatives across the state. The problem was they were pretty much adult driven, and they were almost closed off. If you weren't part of that organization's family, you didn't really fit. Well.
Does that really do any good? Because you're just, you're just a little group acquires that go out. So the challenge is, and the thing that we've all been talking about is how do we, um, expand the opportunities to be in space to have the conversations that we need to have. And that's how you change stigma. And so one of the lessons that we all learned calls Greenville family partnership. Partnership was a partner with us, with rage, because we needed youth, manpower, and female power. So I should say human, or I should say human power.
That's a little bit better to say, because one of the things that we ended up doing, we learned, was to go to where the party was. And one of the most successful things that we did was Friday night rage. We chose the top rivalry game in the state, whether it was single a or four a. And we had a collective of students. These are high school students that would give up their Friday night to go on the road and go to a school where they knew anyone and talk. And it was insanely successful. And so we started thinking about that as a way to start dipping our toe into lifestyle communities that we serve and where it could be opportunities where we could serve a diverse group of people that's family friendly and that we could also, in one way or another, whether it's a little bit off a tangent, it could feel like part of our identity of power collective. So we started playing with that. And you've done that with music and with some other things that you've already done, but things that we're planning. I don't want to jump the gun and say it, but that's something where my part goes into, I guess, my niche.
Not that I'm a guru in it at all or anything, but I, besides being a creative director, art director, a designer of some kind, I practice word of mouth marketing. And I guess for the last 20 years, in my job for, when I worked at an agency in town is, I worked with brands and organizations to build communities. And it was pretty much split 50 50, for profit, not for profit. And that's what rage was. Rage was really a community initiative. And I see power collective as the same. And we're still an infant. We're just learning to crawl and getting our story out there. In a way, I think we're trying to be that beacon out there that's broadcasting in the middle of the night, and you have to first start finding your audience. And you don't. You can either wait for them to find you, or you can go out there and find them.
[00:18:17] Speaker A: Right?
[00:18:18] Speaker B: And that's what we're. To your point, that's what we're doing.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: That's a hundred percent. That's what we're doing. And, you know, our collective thought in the past was, oh, we need to put on an event. We need to put on an event. And so with this, I guess, I don't want to say new way of thinking, but with this other way of thinking, why go through all of that, of putting on a new event in a community that already has so many things going on that you attach yourself to one of those events? So one of our partners, the guys at Cafe west and Coffee for change, did a concerte for us locally back on Thursday, July 11, at Fire Forge Brewery here in Greenville. And so, again, that put us in front of an audience that we would probably not be in front of otherwise. One of the things that we've been working on that I'm really excited about is that the power collective will be one of the presenting sponsors at Greenville County Recreation smash pickleball tournament that they're going to have at the new Riverside Pickleball park place on September 19 through the 22nd. So again, they're going to have between six and 700 people that weekend playing pickleball.
[00:20:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:20:04] Speaker A: And we're going to be there with our tent, with our partners, having conversations, telling stories.
And I'm just, I just got chill bumps because I'm really, really excited about us going down this path to be able to collect one new champions with what we're doing.
But people who probably hadn't thought about what engaging with us to begin with, and now they're like, oh, well, just.
[00:20:41] Speaker B: Imagine if you would have had to have done that, you putting it on from the very, from the starting foundation to get to that level. How much infrastructure work and staff volunteer effort it would be if you had to own all that.
[00:20:58] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:20:59] Speaker B: So, so what, you know, the beauty of that is you take a lifestyle thing, event pickleball, which is insanely hot right now and probably will stay that way for quite a while. And you're getting to tap into a community effort and it's already a collective of people that have a sense of community. So if they invite you in, it is a great opportunity to step into that and to play in that space and find a new reason for people to connect.
I'm not the only one that says this, but we want to be a part of a story bigger than ourselves.
This helps pickleball also, too, have a little bit of a bigger story than just going out there, whacking the ball and dinking and dunking with it.
But I think that's the way organizations, especially not for profits, that are smart, think that way. The challenge comes in when they feel like they've got to own it. We've got to be in control. It's got to fit directly into our thing and it's a got to be plastered with our identity. And what happens with that is, you know, it might think that we're doing the right things for branding, but it doesn't. From a community perspective, I don't think.
[00:22:26] Speaker A: Right, right. And yeah, I would not want to own a pickleball tournament this large. I would love to receive proceeds. Sure. Or if anybody else wanted to do a fundraiser and give us proceeds, I would love that. But again, it puts us in a different spot than what we've been before.
Talk a little bit about some of the messaging and messages that where you're developing that we can use in different places.
I'll go ahead and say it. One of them is, so far, everybody's really, really loved. It is our shirts, our t shirts.
[00:23:14] Speaker B: Well, one of the things, you know, as, you know, challenged by you and the rest of the, you know, the collective is, you know, what. What can we do? What could be some opportunities to look at, help generate awareness for power collective? And. And, you know, this is still an entity in its infancy, but part of it is to know what you stand for, what's your why, what's your how. And so right now, it's still forming. But I took what we looked at when we developed the identity and what we feel like, what we say that power collective stands for, and tried to put my hat on with what could be some community opportunities that you might not necessarily just think of right out of the box, because sometimes, as you know, you have to fight. GreenVIlle is a very robust community of giving, of philanthropy and giving. But that also means there's a lot of people out there that receive that fund. So it's a competitive battle to get it. So where can we fit into a space to where we might excite those, and we could bring something unique to the table that they might not have. And so one of those things, and I'm. I'm a car buff, is car shows. And part of it was right in the middle of the thinking of this. I live near Bridgeway station, and they had their first car show event, which, typically, that cars and coffee is out at Michelin, draws a huge crowd. So now they're doing another version of that at Bridgeway. And I think they still do one periodically out at Michelin. But I was stunned at the turnout. And I guess I just looked at it a little bit with different eyes, because I was looking. I was. You know, sometimes you just. You stumble into something thinking about trying to solve a problem. But I saw all these kids lined up over the bridge, watching the cars go by, videotaping. The police had a presence there from Malden, Simpsonville, I think, maybe even Fountain Inn. I can't remember all of. All the hospitals, healthcare. And oddly, you know, it hit me is that these are partners of Power collective, right? And then I saw banks, other community type groups there that were. That all had the tents around that were sponsoring it. And it really kind of dawned on me as I looked at it, and I actually walked back home. I was with my dog is, oh, what if we did.
Like. We took power collective, and we did power collective, like hot rod t shirts? Because, you know, I grew up on those things and really cool t shirts. They're, when you go to these things, that's what people wear. They. It's kind of like they wear on their pride, their. Their badge, their shirt, their Ford, Chevy, Porsche, BMW, whatever that may be, Audi, merck, whatever that may be, jeep.
And that is a passionate, passionate fan base. And so, you know, I went back and. And started playing with it and, and then kind of, we kind of played with some lines and messaging and then threw that back to you and Wendy on our kind of, like, brain trust team for. For this stuff and. And said, what if we, you know, did a limited edition run of shirts and see what they do and see if we could, you know, try to start selling some merchandise to help generate, you know, some revenue, you know, on the bottom, nothing. It's not going to start out as a really big thing, but it starts because also, too, it's an amplification device. It's a social signaling. Every time a person wears this, somebody else sees it.
[00:27:07] Speaker A: Right.
[00:27:07] Speaker B: And so we're getting our feet wet with this, and they've been really fun to design, and, you know, we're just getting started. We've got a base of, I think we got a trans am, we've got a dodge charger, we got a Mustang, a Camaro coming out. And so we're doing it to where we'll do some. That some, you know, I guess you can. You could buy in person. But we're also looking at what's now called print on demand, like through bonfire, to where that helps an organization like yourself not have to invest in inventory. The shirts are printed as they're sold. So this gives power collective an opportunity to really step into these community events that happen all over the state of South Carolina. And they all have different niches and little experience things, and they always draw a crowd, but it also gives your partnership base and your ability to showcase the locking pill bottles in a person to person experience. And that is priceless.
[00:28:19] Speaker A: Right. Right. And, yeah, that. And for the longest, I've always, oh, we need to do a car show as a fundraiser, but I've actually been in conversation with a couple of organizations that are looking at doing a car shows and the power collective and just say something, being the beneficiary of that. So that's. There's so much going on right now.
And so our website, as I mentioned earlier, is being revamped, and because we have grown so quickly, and I haven't talked, well, I haven't said anything about it, but Gino's alluded to this one of the major pieces that we are providing to the community for free are lockable prescription files.
There's two sizes, and so there's just. It's something that most of us have never seen before. And. But what we know through our third party research is now our first grant was to give out 40,000 of these lockable prescription bottles.
What we know is that once we've given out that initial 14, 40,000 of these, that in a year's time, we'll keep 2.2 million pills from being pilfered and will have an economic impact of just over $29 million.
[00:29:56] Speaker B: Yeah, that's crazy. That's awesome.
[00:29:58] Speaker A: And so we almost have giving those out statewide.
I know one of the things that I've been harping on is Gino. Gino. Wendy. Wendy. I want a map on our website so everybody can see where we have shipped those lockable prescription bottles or vials. Well, our current website won't allow us to do that. So, you know, we're growing. We're expanding. And so, hopefully, when our new site is up, not too much further down the road, we'll be able to highlight and to show, because there are literally places all over the state, and naturally, our big places are. But lower South Carolina, they have some of our lockable prescription bottles.
Greenwood, Edgefield, McCormick, Horry, Florence, Lake City, some of those smaller towns. To our partners that are out there that are working in this is not just say something. It's not just the power collective, but collectively, whether they're places of worship, whether they're mental health, whether they're Department of health, whether they're recovery, whether they're treatment, whether they're prevention, the whole gamut are handing out these bottles that they got from the power collective across the state.
Part of what I want to do with the funding from the shirts is to help keep that supply going and add to it. And so what does that next part look like? It looks like we pull up in an event. We have backpacks that have the power collective and 988 logo on it. And then in that, there are a couple of our lockable prescription vials. There's Narcan, there's fentanyl and xylazine test strips. There's Datera recycling pill patches, pods in there. There's just so much that we're looking at that we can expand this to go along with raising the awareness, getting rid of the stigma, and just on and on, as we grow and grow and grow and grow.
[00:32:30] Speaker B: I think the beautiful thing about that, and I think the challenge always, I don't know, in my, my, I guess, experience with working with, um, you know, with prevention, a lot of times, a lot of it is pure awareness or, um, prevention programs, but not a physical thing that can make a difference. Well, in this case, I think the beauty of this, what we're initial grant filled with this out, is an actual physical thing that, if used properly and done right, can save a life.
[00:33:12] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:33:13] Speaker B: And you, most of the time, I hate to say it, a lot of prevention programs, they don't have that, that finite pillar there that can actually, it's got a job to do right. And so I think that's a beauty of that. And in a way that is tangible. Yes.
[00:33:36] Speaker A: Right there.
[00:33:37] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:38] Speaker A: And that's always been one of the issues with funders is, well, proved to us what you're doing is making a difference.
[00:33:46] Speaker B: Absolutely. Well, that gives you that. That's why I think, you know, as, as we've kind of alluded to, when you start something new like this, like power collective, it's a baby learning to crawl.
We put a baby website up that was really just, it was to help with awareness and start building the process of some content. And we need to grow it into a real website that can function and be able, that we can build modules and things like an interactive map. And so that requires a different type of database and things like that. And that's where we're going with wonderful partners. And so I do think what that will do is start to help you with your story, because, you know, if you can roll over that and go to Loris, South Carolina, and possibly have a testimonial or a story there that comes from each one of these, like from Greenwood and Pickenshen, Greenville, Simpsonville, Berea.
You know, it needs to show what the reality is. And that's what helps break the stigma that this happens on Augusta Road as much as it does on Whitehorse Road.
[00:35:03] Speaker A: Right. 100%.
[00:35:05] Speaker B: It's not just bound by socioeconomics. And so that's how we start to combat that stigma and fight it and win that war.
[00:35:20] Speaker A: So as we wrap this up, I know we've talked about the shirts. So can they go to powercollectivesc.com and get those shirts or where do they need to go?
[00:35:33] Speaker B: They, right now, what we've got, we need to, we need to have a link when we get with the site, but we'll, we'll make sure that we've got some way that you can go from there to it. But you would, you would go to bonfire and do, just say something with the bonfire page. And that's how you would, if you did, if you search bonfire, which is a fairly well known, they're known for doing campaigns for not for profits, and that's kind of how they cut their teeth. They do high quality shirts that, that really are silkscreen. They, a lot of times with a, with the print on demand, it's like a digital process looking shirt. They still look good, but they don't look as good as an old school silk screen shirt does.
[00:36:14] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:36:15] Speaker B: And these bonfire shirts look more, they're more, I would say they're just a higher quality. And so if you go to bonfire and you search, just say something. You're going to find the power collector shirts. And that is going to be a collection that we're going to expand out on. So there will be other new shirts going. But right now we've got, we've got enough to offer that if you're, you got a, a car that you like, we've got a hot rod, vintage looking ride for you.
[00:36:43] Speaker A: Yep. No doubt. No doubt. Also, check out our social media accounts with power collective and just say something that there's also an opportunity, and I think some pictures of some of the shirts on that. So for our listeners out there, get one of your shirts now. And so with that, I want to bring this to a close.
Our goal is, again, to provide as much awareness and education and prevention as possible. And part of that is raising the awareness, removing the stigma.
We do have the lockable prescription vials that we do have available.
If you're in Greenville, you can come by the office and see them. If you're not, I bet you can reach out to me, and I can tell you somebody close by that does. But you can find more information about the lockable prescription bottles at www.powercollectivesc.com.
and you can find out more about. Just say something. At www. Just say something. Sc.org dot g know. I want to thank you for your time and your energy and your passion to help us grow this, build this, grow this and spread it across the state.
[00:38:10] Speaker B: Well, it's my humble honor. This is, this is great. You know, this is doing work like this. And I think, you know, I hope, I hope you have out there, if you're listening to this, you have, you have a desire to do this, too, is that, you know, we work hard and sometimes we lose the joy of our work. And work like this helps to provide that joy and also comes back to helping you as you go to bed at night and lay your head on your pillow, that maybe you did something to help someone's life be better. And so, you know, I'm thankful for the opportunity.
[00:38:48] Speaker A: Well, you never know how many lives you'll be able to touch.
Well, Gino, again, thank you. And for our listeners out there, thank you again for tuning in. Be on the lookout for a new podcast that comes out every Tuesday. And so they're available on all forms of wherever podcasts are, whether it's YouTube or Spotify or Apple, just you name it. Wendy is our expert, and she has us there. So again, thank you, Gino and Wendy, thank you. And thank you, listeners, and look forward to seeing you next time. Have a great day.
