The Concord Cheese Shop has long been a favorite lunch destination for Middlesex students, but this spring the town institutions strengthened ties further by teaming up for an innovative marketing project. Cheese Shop owner Peter Lovis had been looking to refresh his promotional materials for the store’s monthly Cheese Lovers Club, so he turned to a team of graphic designers just down Lowell Road: The Middlesex Printmaking and Graphic Design class.
“The project was a great way for the students to apply what they’ve learned to a real-world experience,” says Megan Morrison ’11, who teaches the mixed media art elective. To further immerse her students in the world of graphic design, she asked fellow faculty member Juan Gonzalez to talk to the class about his past experience working in a marketing firm in Spain. Gonzalez shed light on the inner workings of a professional marketing agency, describing the typical evolution of a creative project from conception to publication.
Following a meeting in which Lovis outlined the Cheese Shop’s product offerings and target demographics, the students went to work crafting media that would fit their client’s advertising needs. The two-week project culminated with the students pitching their ideas to Lovis in a formal presentation that left him full of marketing ideas—and everyone else hungry for lunch.