We’re pleased to announce that we’ve been named one of Seattle Business magazine’s 100 Best Companies to Work For!

View the complete ranked list.

HL2 is more than an agency partner. We’re an extension of the Park City team.

After a lot of late nights, long hours, and coffee IV drips, we’re proud to announce some exciting new business news: HL2 is now the agency of record for Park City Mountain Resort in Utah! Our work for the resort will include branding, social media, strategic consultation, web site design, collateral, and on-mountain signage. Nice job, team.

“We couldn’t be more elated to be the new agency of record for Park City Mountain Resort! We knew we were the perfect fit from the get-go—they were looking for collaborative and innovative creative thinkers, and the chemistry between the Park City team and ours was undeniable. Coupled with the fact that they’re a dream client—incredibly savvy marketers looking to take their brand to the next level—it’s a match made in heaven.”

–Laura Masters, Account Director

…our work for HTC!

Newly launched htc.com snagged silver at Wednesday night’s Seattle ADDY celebration.

See the entire list of winners here.

“With over 60,000 entries annually, the ADDY® Awards are the world’s largest and arguably toughest advertising competition. The ADDY® Awards represent the true spirit of creative excellence by recognizing all forms of advertising from media of all types, creative by all sizes and entrants of all levels from anywhere in the world.” www.aaf.org

Our ten-day journey to the Dominican Republic (DR) has come to a close.

In conjunction with Children of the Nations (Silverdale, Wash.) – a nonprofit that partners with nationals to provide holistic care for destitute children – an eight person HL2 team traveled to a region of the DR called Barahona. The team laid cement floors in two homes, baked bread for Haitian refugees, taught English and, most importantly, spent time with children living in the region – laughing, playing and learning.

The trip was rich with human connection, vibrant colors and experience (both tangible and not). Over the coming weeks, each team member will post about his or her individual experiences in the DR.

On February 21, eight HL2 employees will travel to the Dominican Republic for a week of humanitarian service. They will work in several poor villages made up of refugees and orphans from the recent earthquake in Haiti.

Activities will include physical labor (laying down concrete floors for an orphanage), athletics (coaching and playing soccer and baseball with children), and education (teaching children about photography and computers). We will also provide basic supplies for many of these destitute children.

The trip is being led by Children of the Nations (Silverdale, Wash.), a nonprofit that partners with nationals to provide holistic care for orphaned and destitute children, enabling them to create positive and lasting change in their nations.

Each year, as everyone groans at the tax prep ahead, we celebrate. In 2010, the culmination of our seven-year partnership with H&R Block has resulted in the latest step in the evolution of their digital consumer brand. TaxCut® has become H&R Block At Home™.

Beyond the usual deliverables—packaging and retail channel marketing—we completed    in-depth rebranding for the do-it-yourself tax solution, inclusive of product naming, a brand strategy, national focus group testing and a new identity for H&R Block At Home™.

Today, we launch htc.com—a site built to reveal HTC as the world’s leading innovative supplier of smartphones.

Each year, HL2 creates collateral for Team Parkinson’s as they participate in the Seattle to Portland Bicycle Classic. This year, our copywriter decided to try something a little different, and created bike hangers—each with an inspiring push to join the team. Distributed across every bike in sight, over several afternoons, the Northwest Parkinson’s Foundation     message reached hundreds of riders across Seattle.

The Davey Awards are for the “David’s” (vs. Goliath) of the marketing world, “who derive their strength from big ideas, rather than stratospheric budgets.”

We just launched the WBBA* website and are excited about what’s going on in the Seattle biotech field.

*Washington Biotechnology and Biomedical Association

Don Low, featured on marketinghitch.com, shares his thoughts on the RFP process, brilliant marketing, and what the agency of the future will look like.

The logo is featured in the Graphis Design Annual 2010. Graphis is one of the world’s leading creative publications, and we are thrilled to be a part of it.

For the design enthusiast, view the entire annual. There is some incredible design work inside.

HL2 partnered with Microsoft in this site redesign to support the rebrand of Windows Mobile to Windows Phone, as well as the launch of the 6.5 OS.

Check out the “Explore Phones” section—an innovative way to browse and buy. Look at all those pretty HTC phones.

Several HL2 projects were honored in this year’s Design of the Times competition:

Seattle’s Best Coffee Spring Banner garnered Gold.
Seattle’s Best Coffee Anniversary Roast won Bronze.
H&R Block TaxCut Packaging took Bronze.

“The DOT Awards recognize the retail industry’s best displays and promotions. The submissions are judged on creativity, innovation, practicality, branding and achievement of sales and marketing objectives.”

HL2’s microsite, YouTube channel and team of bloggers for iamenabled.com were inducted into MarketingSherpa’s Viral Marketing Hall of Fame 2009 yesterday.

MarketingSherpa is a highly respected online marketing publication, and it’s a big honor to have your campaign recognized among the likes of Disney.