photo by steed media service

In the current landscape of modern American advertising where stereotypes and bogus images of ethnic groups pop up at every commercial break, people like Rudy Gaskins are in dire need. As the president and executive creative director of the New Yorkbased Push Creative, Gaskins (along with his staff), provides innovative marketing and branding solutions for several entertainment and corporate companies including American Express, BET, ABC and The New York Times.

In August, Push Creative joined Unity Media and Beverly Hillsbased branding firm Walton Isaacson as part of a team of African American-owned businesses working to promote the Lexus brand to African Americans in both urban and suburban markets. “When they selected our group to sell that car, to advertise and market that car, they were also saying that they saw us as being in that same elite level of quality as they’ve put into that vehicle,” says Gaskins.

Gaskins believes that corporations seeking out the services of minority-owned branding firms are smartening up. In the meantime, their competition suffers from grouping audiences and pigeonholing them into population boxes based on zip codes.

“By thinking of [people] as a community cluster, you tend to think of them as a monolithic group, as a one-dimensional group. That leads to caricatures and stereotypes,” says Gaskins. “In many cases, advertising has the power to insult those communities. We’re starting to look at that in new ways for the first time in the industry and we see ways to fix that.” - gavin p. godfrey

For more information, visit www.pushcreative.tv.

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