When she began her Advanced Advertising Campaigns course this January, communications junior Mary Lanaux thought that preparing an ad campaign for the state of Florida would be interesting and fun.

However, after four months of long nights and hard work, she supplemented her opinion with the word “exhausted.”

Today, 16 Loyola advertising majors will put their work to the test. They are traveling to the seventh district competition of the National Student Advertising Campaign in Biloxi, Miss. There they will compete against 10 schools in their district for a spot in the national competition, which takes place in June.

Communications senior Priscilla Hollier, creative director of the project, said that this year’s client, FLAUSA, wanted the team to find ways to increase overnight stays in hotels and increase travel revenue in Florida.

“We needed to bring money to Florida,” Hollier said. “We needed to brand the campaign, to get their logo out.”

The team thought of several ways to reach their primary target market, the baby boomers. They designed an ad to run in magazines and on television, interviewed 144 people and designed a line of promotional items that included a water bottle that holds a hotel key and a “Visit Florida” vacation van.

They also had to design a 32-page plan book that contained detailed research, ad layouts and their rationale for the proposed campaign. The book was sent to the competition judges weeks in advance and counts for 50 percent of their score.

Today, they have 20 minutes to present their campaign to five judges. Account executive and communications senior Caryn Hein said that this part of their campaign took all of spring break to prepare and could boost or destroy their score.

“The presentation was really tough to do. We had to fit 32 pages of material into 20 minutes, and if we go over the time, we’re disqualified,” Hein said.

Loyola won the NSAC in 1995, and Hein said that she hoped to bring the trophy back to the university this year.

However, Hollier said that if they win the regional competition and move on to nationals, the other schools will be fighting as hard as they are.

“At nationals it’s really tough because you compete against the best of the best,” she said. “We have to convince five people that we are the best. We have to sell it.”

Lanaux said that the team is ready to do just that.

“We are advertisers. This is what we will be doing for the rest of our lives, and this is what we’re good at,” Lanaux said.

Hein agreed that the team has worked hard and is excited to see their hard work pay off.

“It’s busy and it takes a lot of dedication, but it’s a high,” Hein said. “You see what you’ve devoted your life to all semester come to life. Nothing’s better than that moment.”

~ Katie Ide can be reached at [email protected].