Alden, Minnesota’s Karen King is often described as a gifted strategic planner and brand identity builder. As the President and CEO of Spawn’s Ideas, an Alaska-based agency, King has worked, crafted or re-energized identities for the City of Anchorage, GCI (telecom), the University of Alaska Anchorage, Kaladi Bros. Coffee, Alyeska Pipeline and others.
When not at work, you’ll find her out on her 37-foot cabin cruiser, the MV Grizzly Bear, skiing or kayaking.
DIVERGE spoke to King about the agency, working in Alaska and more:
What is it like running an agency headquartered in Alaska?
The most exciting and perhaps surprising thing is the similarity to client work elsewhere. I came to Alaska thinking that my work here couldn’t possibly compare with the work I’d experienced elsewhere with national brands like Coca-Cola, Kraft General Mills and others. I quickly realized that the challenges are the same; it’s just the scale that can vary. We like to say that it’s our goal that our staff “do the best work of their lives here” and many truly do. We have a Denver office as well.
That “pledge” is aided by a uniquely assertive desire to prove ourselves — to show our smarts as well as our resolve – to not let stereotypes about where we live taint expectations because they shouldn’t. We are a well-traveled, highly educated group of people we call perpetual adventurers. There is a curiosity, restlessness and passion we exercise as part of our lifestyle experience that carries over to our work.
And, as an independent and employee-owned agency, we have the opportunity and responsibility to run this business and evolve it. Each of us has a stake in its success that is far beyond a job or career: it’s ours.
Involvement in community and issues that affect us is highly mentored and valued in Alaska. It’s so palpable the difference we can make in our communities and state – as we often know the state decision-makers including elected leaders personally. So, with some interest and perseverance you can be involved, known and often recruited to participate, and be influential too. It’s very rewarding.
The final thing I’ll mention is the lifestyle bent found with people in both our Anchorage and Denver offices. Where we live, respect for what people do for fun and adventure is equal to or exceeds what they do for work, and is often infinitely more interesting to talk about J
How do you differ from other agencies?
There is an earnestness about the people who work for Spawn and a pluckiness (love that word because its so appropriate to where we live and work). My staff ought to be listed in the dictionary under the definition of “authenticity” – they are genuine, hardworking people who really fulfill that perpetual adventurer label I mentioned earlier.
Living here, you forget that the fact that climbing, fishing in remote areas, captaining a cabin cruiser, or doing three kinds of skiing isn’t normal. It’s an adventurous lifestyle and that same “reach” mentality is encouraged in our approach to work. We want to be seen as an agency that punches above its weight so that’s how we work everyday and with every project.
What is one of your favorite projects that you have worked on?
One of the most meaningful projects we worked on recently was a suicide prevention effort in Alaska. The state has one of the highest suicide rates in the nation, with more young people dying by suicide than in any other state.
The initiative began as a local project for one Rotary club and, with that club’s support and some big goals, it grew to include every Rotary club in the district (Alaska and the Yuko)
Our prevention campaign was based on the insight that most people don’t realize they have the power to save another’s life. They are already uncomfortable talking about suicide, as well as fearful that they may say the wrong thing and make a situation worse. Our campaign reassured the audience that no experience was necessary and “the only wrong thing is to say nothing at all.”
This was a comprehensive campaign, with TV, a website, digital advertising, suicide prevention training for 1400 people and a youth peer-to-peer effort. Spawn not only developed the strategy, creative, placed media and more – we sought and delivered both media and corporate cash sponsorships to be sure that the message was fully and effectively supported and heard statewide.
Most importantly, the effort continues. Its primary corporate sponsor, GCI (Alaska’s largest telecom), was roused by its participation and elected to continue suicide prevention efforts on its own into a second year. Their commitment was internal with its thousands of employees, and external with a six-figure commitment to fund grants to non-profits doing suicide prevention work in the state. To have sparked and interest and commitment to continue this lifesaving work was and is amazing.
How important is diversity to your agency?
Alaska, in particular, is a very diverse place. There are large populations of first peoples here (Alaska Native) of course, but also of Pacific Islanders and many others. One of our high schools is considered the most diverse in the nation. That said, it’s natural that diversity is very important to us and our clients.
Spawn is about 65% female, and four of five executive members are women. Diversity of ages is also important and, again, about 65% are Millennials here. And gender equality is a big deal to us.
Of course, we’re culturally diverse too – some Alaskans believe their children “don’t see color” because they have so many friends of different ethnicities, and to them, it’s their complete norm.
Can you share some policies that are unique, such as the babies till they crawl policy?
Parents (moms and dads) can bring their infants into the office from the time they return from maternity/paternity leave until they begin to crawl. We have a closed-door office for these parents and seeing and holding babies in the office is a wonderful break in the day. Our administration/accounting staff are happy to “babysit” the child when mom or dad are in a meeting. It’s a joyful thing and bonds us to both the parent and the child more closely as we witness the baby growing up even years later.
Another unique benefit is an annual allowance we give each employee to pay entrance fees for runs, walks, triathlons, state park passes, etc. This is on top of the free health club membership offered to each staff member and a broader wellness plan. We want to do everything we can to encourage good health and fitness, so we also organize staff fitness challenges several times a year.
Of course we offer a lot of flexibility around our staff’s family member illnesses, deaths in the family, etc. Right now, that policy is being extended to a director who is losing her dog to old age and illness. She works from home parts of days and even whole days to care for the dog and enjoy the time remaining.
We try to feed our staff’s love of the outdoors which starts with our Anchorage office location (one block from the 11-mile-long Tony Knowles Coastal Trail.) We’ve offered a shared business ski pass at the local resort in our recent past, and one of our staff organizes a hike she calls “Peak A Week” in summer. We also just designed a brainstorming room as a campfire setting, complete with surrounding tree-lined vinyl walls and an indoor campfire (fake fire of course).
Who are some of your clients?
McDonald’s Alaska
Midas Alaska
BP
Alaska Railroad
Alaskan Brewing
GCI (telecom, cable TV, internet)
University of Alaska
Outdoor Industry Association
Northrim Bank
Fairbanks Memorial Hospital
Alaska Department of Transportation
The Nature Conservancy
Talk about your decision to buy the agency, how it became a reality and how you turned it into what it is now?
I am an owner – but so is everyone else: we’re employee owned (an ESOP – employee stock ownership plan). I’ve been employed at the agency since 1999 and became president eight years ago.
We have evolved a lot over the years, as is necessary in our fast moving industry. The ESOP move was a great way for the former owner to get some value from the agency he’d built while also creating a legacy of sorts. Becoming an ESOP has fostered an ownership mentality that benefits our work for clients and us too – we’ve all got a stake in our success. We grew about 40% three years ago and then changed our name to Spawn Ideas (from The Nerland Agency) a year later to assert our independence as an ESOP. We formally started an account planning practice last year though we’d been doing planning for some time. We have also just established a design thinking and data sciences practice into our planning department, which is being spearheaded by some of our younger employees.
With additional employees in Denver, including our Creative Director, Mike Weed, we are 40-employee owners strong, offering a full range of services from creative to media to production, and upping our game all of the time. It’s exciting to constantly see employees taking initiative to keep the agency moving forward.
Any new projects coming up?
We recently completed a new campaign for Alaskan Brewing that includes exciting and unique elements. We love this brand and its fervently Alaskan sensibility.
And we love the customer journey work we’re doing for the Outdoor Industry Association (OIA). It’s based on the very comprehensive audience persona work they already have in place, and will help OIA members build solutions that adapt to their consumers’ mindset, preferences and goals along their path-to-purchase. This work will be released later this spring.
How important is diversity to your clients?
It’s very important because the population, especially in Alaska, is so diverse. So it’s essential that the audiences we’re engaging see themselves in the work.
