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Evangelizing Generation X
Back-to-school ads highlight everyday issues, invite viewers to church

by Episcopal News Service
9/1/2005
Spanish-language a priority for TV ad
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Back-to-school tv advertisements in Spanish aimed at Generation X viewers unaffiliated with any church premiered Aug. 26 on Galavision, a cable network widely watched among Latinos. The ads continue until Sept. 12 as part of the advertising initiative launched by the last General Convention.

“With the growing number of native Spanish speakers in the United States as well as in the Episcopal Church, we felt that there was a strong need to produce [the ad] in both English and Spanish to maximize its potential reach,” said Michael Collins, church director of broadcast and multimedia communication. “We’ve also made an effort to ensure that the spot receives strong play on Galavision, a Spanish-language network that fits in very well with what we are trying to accomplish overall with the national advertising plan.”

Canon Robert Williams, director of communication, called Spanish-language communication a priority. “This ad helps the Episcopal Church deepen its communication and outreach in Spanish among one of the largest demographic constituencies in the United States and the Americas,” he said.



Come and Grow
The Episcopal Church welcomes you to come and grow in understanding, gratitude, service, and peace.  Visit this website and see recent Episcopal advertisements.  More

Young adults facing everyday challenges are the focus of a new television spot that invites viewers to visit the Episcopal Church.

Designed for a target audience of Generation Xers unaffiliated with any church, the new 30-second ad is currently airing on national television in English and Spanish until Sept. 12. A second ad has been produced to air next May. Air time also is planned for overseas dioceses.

The church’s national purchase, coordinated by Time Warner Cable, will air the new “Monitors” back-to-school ad, designed and market-tested to reach 22- to 42-year-old viewers, on the ABC Family, Discovery Health, Lifetime Movie and Hallmark networks and in Spanish on Galavision. The channels were chosen for their high numbers of Gen X viewers, said Michael Collins, director of broadcast and multimedia communication.

Gen X was chosen as the primary target market after consultation among the Episcopal Church Center’s offices of congregational development, ministry with young people, Hispanic ministries, and communication.

The ads use television monitors to portray personal concerns – military service, a hospitalized child, accumulating bills and a car accident – experienced by four Gen Xers and to suggest how church attendance might help them cope with these and other challenges. The ads include an invitation to “change your channel” from anxiety to peace and bring viewers the message: “The Episcopal Church welcomes you: Come and Grow.”

Contributions welcome

The ads are part of the $750,000 national campaign funded by the last General Convention. In June, Executive Council approved an online system in which individual donors can make contributions to increase air time for the television campaign.

The contribution system follows a similar program through which the United Church of Christ reportedly raised more than $500,000 for its TV ads. Fully secure credit-card transactions can be completed at http://www.comeandgrow.org/, the church’s website.

Numerous regional and local ad campaigns in dioceses from Puerto Rico to Alaska are augmenting the national purchase. These include the dioceses of Southern Ohio, Bethlehem, Chicago, Michigan, Delaware, Iowa, Texas, Los Angeles and Utah and the cities of New Orleans, Seattle and the San Francisco Bay area.

Free consultations on buying local time are available from the Episcopal Media Center at 800-229-3788.