How Brooke Langmaid and Sophia Storti Turned Their Young Lions Submission Into a Nationwide Campaign.
Brooke Langmaid and Sophia Storti, creatives from ZGM Modern Marketing Partners in Edmonton placed Bronze in the 2024 Canadian Young Lions Competition Print Category. Their work for Second Harvest, Canada’s largest food rescue organization, resonated so strongly that it was produced into a full-scale national campaign.
With the Young Lions 2025 Competition registration opening on January 13th, we’re revisiting their journey to celebrate their achievement and hear from Second Harvest about their experience as the charity partner.
Break down your experience at Young Lions 2024 – what were the highlights or key takeaways?
BL: It was so fun to get that early morning brief and lock in for 24 hours. This year was our 2nd time doing Young Lions. The tight timeline makes us approach it much differently than our client work. It forces you to just dial in and make decisions while the clock is ticking. Especially after this year, it gave us more confidence in trusting our guts. we’re used to running ideas past our Creative Director, so having to make the calls ourselves – and the results that came from that – felt quite nice.
The CMDC Media Summit was a special experience in person. Listening to Lori Nikkel’s talk before the winner’s announcement was a highlight – her passion for what she does is contagious and the energy she had on stage was incredible. It made it that much more special when we heard from her & Second Harvest the next day.
SS: This year, we were more prepared to spend all 24 hours in the ZGM office, ready to take naps and snacks as needed. At around 11 pm, we were stumped and went down to the café under the office for a break. We went through all our ideas and kept coming back to the garbage picker in a farm field. It was late, so we decided to go all in and hope for the best.
We found out we were shortlisted while I was on a shoot in Calgary. Brooke told me to go somewhere private to take a call, and I nervously snuck into a bedroom in the home we were shooting at. We couldn’t tell anyone about the news until the shortlist was officially announced, so I had to go back to the shoot and pretend nothing happened.
The event itself was so exciting. It was Brooke and I’s first time at the CMDC Media Summit – we flew in from Edmonton the night before. We didn’t know anyone there, but the other Young Lions were so friendly and welcoming to us as the only team from Western Canada.
Tell us about the moment that you learned Second Harvest would be moving forward with your work. What was that like for you?
BL: It was the day after the Media Summit. Our flights home to Edmonton were delayed that morning so we were making the most of our extra day in Toronto. We were in a vintage store in Kensington and got a message from our creative director, Kurt Beaudoin, asking if we could hop on a quick call. Rob Fairhead, a partner at ZGM, called us and told us that Second Harvest loved our ad and wanted to run it in their upcoming campaign. Then he said they also wanted to make a national TV PSA spot with us. Some happy tears were shed, it was an emotional moment!
SS: In the middle of our thrifting, I had just left for the bathroom and Brooke had taken the call before I got back. Based on the expression on her face, I thought something terrible had happened. Turns out it was just shock! Rob told us that Second Harvest contacted ZGM and wanted to produce our ad because it really resonated with them. At this point, I think a few happy tears were shed. Knowing our idea impacted the client enough to want it to represent their brand in the real world was the highest form of compliment.
Walk us through the process of turning the initial print ad into a full campaign. What were the key steps, and who played a role in bringing the project to life?
BL: Our clients at Second Harvest, Abigail St. Pierre, Director of Marketing, and Jackie Marchildon, Interim Vice President of Marketing & Communications, reached out to ZGM after the Media Summit. They told us they have an upcoming campaign with placements in The Globe and Mail, and OOH in Toronto. First, we adapted our Young Lions entry (which was a double-page spread) into a single full-page print ad. We also found a solution based on the same creative for a digital billboard. We then turned to figure out how to bring our print ad to life on-screen, where it takes a bit of an off-putting approach to the food waste scenes. We shot the spot over the summer with our production partners Cooper & O’Hara here in Edmonton. It was important to us that we didn’t waste any food from the production. Everything we “wasted” on screen was saved and eaten after.
SS: First, we found out that Second Harvest had an upcoming campaign they wanted to use our creative for. So, we quickly adapted our print ad concept into an actual print ad that ran in The Globe and Mail and OOH in Toronto. Coming from Alberta, this was the largest market my work has ever appeared in. Then in the summer, we continued working with Second Harvest to produce the TV ad. Our awesome accounts team, Rob Fairhead, Partner, and Emery Mindana, Account Manager, worked out all the details and then we shot the ad in Alberta in August with Cooper & O’Hara.
Any plans to participate in the Young Lions competition in 2025? How would you approach it differently this year?
BL: Of course! I think we’ll approach it quite similarly this year—by answering the brief as if it were for one of our own clients. We’ll bring our absolute best with plenty of snacks and a heightened hunger for gold.
SS: We’ll definitely be doing Young Lions again! I’d stay a bit more hydrated this time around and take more breaks from screens to keep my mind refreshed.
What would you tell someone who is on the fence about competing in Young Lions 2025?
BL: Don’t hesitate, just do it! You never know what could happen. You’ll learn something from it no matter what. It’s a great way to put your skills to the test no matter how experienced / what point in your career you’re in. Plus it’s a fun team/relationship-building experience for you and your creative partner.
SS: Just do it. It’s so much fun, and an amazing opportunity for a small investment of your time. The worst that could happen is that you don’t win. The best that could happen is your idea ends up on national TV.
Next, we heard from Lori Nikkel, Chief Executive Officer of Second Harvest.
What was it like being chosen as the charity partner for the Young Lions competition? How did this collaboration align with Second Harvest’s mission?
LN: Being chosen as the charity partner for the Young Lions competition was a fantastic opportunity for Second Harvest.
This collaboration allowed us to engage with some of the most creative and driven young professionals in the media industry, bringing fresh perspectives to the urgent issue of food waste. We loved seeing all of the entries and the different ways people chose to tell our story and highlight the need for action.
So many of the submissions aligned well with our desire to increase awareness about food waste and to feed more people across Canada. Through this opportunity, we could share our vision of a world with no waste and no hunger with a new audience, inspiring innovative ideas to help make that vision a reality.
What stood out to you about Brooke and Sophia’s piece? What was the process like as the work moved from the Bronze Winner to a full campaign?
LN: We loved the simplicity and impact of Brooke and Sophia’s ad. It perfectly illustrated the shocking statistics around food waste in Canada.
An opportunity for billboard ads came up right after they won Bronze and we needed to move quickly to secure the space at a discounted rate, so we reached out to the team at ZGM to discuss using the ad. We worked together to rework some of the copy to better reflect our messaging and the result was a great ad we used on digital billboards and in print.
Since then, we’ve worked together to turn the ad into a PSA that ran for eight weeks, garnering 9 million impressions – we hope to work together again in 2025! The team at ZGM is invested in us and we love the energy they bring to Second Harvest campaigns!
