Advertising team finds it pays to work, work and work some more Chapman team wins District 15 NSAC Competition

After a year of work, nearly 2,000 hours and a couple all-nighters, a team of Chapman University students has won the District 15 National Student Advertising Competition (NSAC).

Called Circle Advertising, the 32-member team from Chapman’s Dodge College of Film and Media Arts competed against numerous Southern California universities at a competition held April 14 in San Diego. This is the second consecutive first place for the team.

To win, students created a complete strategic campaign for a corporate client, work that began in an advertising club during the fall and then picked up steam in the spring as a semester-long course.

“It’s definitely a very crazy and time-consuming process but we have a lot of fun with that when it’s 3 a.m. and everyone’s kind of delirious. It’s beauty in the creative process,” said Tammy Taller ’17, a Circle Advertising account director and four-year veteran of Chapman’s NSAC teams.

This year’s corporate client was Tai Pei Frozen Foods, which challenged the student teams to create a campaign for its product updates. To prepare for the real-world experience, Circle Advertising assigned members to graphic design, media, strategy and experiential departments. They presented their concepts and designs in a 27-page book outlining the entire campaign.

“As an ad industry agency-owner, I would tell you these students’ commitment to the program and each other is unparalleled. I wish in the business world I’d always experienced this. They learn the fundamentals of putting together a campaign, but they learn so much more in how to work together effectively and this experience will give them life-long friends,” said faculty member and team advisor John Most.

And the work continues. The team advances to a regional competition on Thursday, May 4, when they will present their campaign to a new set of judges during a videoconference. Regional winners will compete at the national NSAC competition in New Orleans June 7-8.

Learn more about all the team at the Circle Advertising website.