We are thrilled to announce that our latest non-profit web design project has picked up top honors at the Interactive Media Awards (IMA). The NewSchools Venture Fund website won the coveted IMA Best in Class Award with an overall score of 484 (out of a possible 500) in the ‘Nonprofit’ category. The Best in Class award is the highest honor bestowed by the Interactive Media Awards. It represents the very best in planning, execution and overall professionalism.

How The Judges Rated The Site

• Design: 96/100
• Content: 97/100
• Feature Functionality: 100/100
• Usability: 93/100
• Standards Compliance & Cross-Browser Compatibility: 98/100

Total: 484

Congratulations to Iron Design Director Alice Bybee for, well, the design! Additional kudos to Sam Evans for his Standards Compliant coding prowess. Respect!

Find out more about the NewSchools project.

Check it out!

The toolworks.org website launch completes our rebrand for Toolworks, a self-supporting nonprofit that is devoted to helping people with disabilities connect with the opportunities in their community. After redesigning their identity and stationery system, we created templates for their day to day operational needs, brand guidelines and began work on bringing their brand to life through their website.

With a stream-lined site structure and media-rich content, the new website enables Toolworks to spotlight their client success stories. Our strong attention to accessibility ensures past, present and future clients and supporters will also be able to navigate the site with ease. We built the site on top of WordPress, an easy to use content management system, to allow Toolworks the flexibility to maintain the website themselves, with support from Iron when needed.

The new website allows Toolworks to focus on running and promoting the social ventures that allow them to provide social services to over 500 individuals with disabilities every year. Their latest endeavor, Bakeworks, was featured on Huffington Post San Francisco.

NewSchools Venture Fund is a nonprofit venture philanthropy firm working to transform public education for low-income children. Our challenge was to build a digital presence that would stand tall among Silicon Valley audiences and reflect the innovation and transformative results for which they are known. The site needed to portray the true face of NewSchools and tell a narrative to potential entrepreneurs, funders and the thousands that will visit. The new site has an integrated array of features including a blog, picture galleries, videos and other key resources. You’ll also find case studies of the great work NewSchools ventures have done.

How do you thank the communities and people who have supported your business for the past 75 years? How about with some groceries, gas, coffee and lunch… all for FREE! Patelco is celebrating their 75th anniversary and this is how we’re helping them to say “thank you”.

Yesterday, Stephen Curry of the Golden State Warriors, and Patelco Credit Union executives, kicked off the Patelco Pays Your Way campaign by visiting Lucky Supermarkets in Oakland. The team personally handed out $75 Lucky gift cards to 75 lucky grocery shoppers. This was the first in a series of Patelco Pays your Way events that we’ve helped coordinate.

Patelco Pays Your Way events will continue every Monday through Friday between March 15 and April 15 with Patelco representatives popping up at select Lucky Supermarkets, ARCO stations, Tully’s Coffee, Jamba Juice, and Panera Bread locations throughout the Bay Area.

In addition to helping individuals cover the cost of every-day purchases, Patelco is also offering more than $40,000 worth of prizes to its memebers as well as a chance for members and non-members to win $50,000 with one toss of a cupcake.

To find out where the Patelco Pays Your Way team may strike next, visit www.patelcopays.org

This month we launched a new brand identity for Toolworks – a nonprofit organization that creates social and economic opportunities for people with disabilities. Our objective was to refresh the overall look and feel of the brand – from the group’s printed materials to its web presence.

In order to develop the new creative we helped reposition the organization, developing a fully-fledged strategic brief. The goal of the creative became to embody the new strategy, while capturing Toolworks’ unconventional spirit and uninhibited commitment to getting the job done. As such, the visual language we developed needed to reference the organization’s boldness and passion while presenting a unique, modern front.

Simple, elegant, san serif typography is treated with a progressive color palette and the interlocking double “O” motif suggest cooperation, strength and partnership. All key tenets of the brand strategy. The web site is under development and we’ll follow up with news of its launch in the coming months.

When the The First Tee of San Francisco approached us, they had a unique challenge. They needed donations from individual donors and corporations to keep their program running, yet they had no official fundraising program, and no way to recognize the people who support them financially.

After launching into a brand strategy overhaul, we quickly designed event invites and new membership materials, as well a series of email newsletters. The result? The consistent, sophisticated branding led to increased First Tee Club membership and a staggering 2000% ROI following the first mailing of the membership brochure. They now have the tools they need to pursue funding and to recognize and maintain contact with those that provide invaluable financial support. Check out their program and help keep kids out of the rough.

After the redesign of their main website by Iron Creative, the Boys and Girls Clubs of San Francisco (BGCSF) wanted to ensure their Camp Mendocino site aligned with the new look and feel. They turned to Iron again to reinvigorate and strategically streamline the Camp site.

We designed and developed the site with an integrated CMS, dynamic content and 3D elements that harken back to the main site. The prominent “call to action” buttons help facilitate the user experience and lead people to the pages deemed most important by BGCSF. The seamless integration with Facebook and YouTube encourages continued social interaction with the site as new sessions of camp are completed.

KIPP Bay Area Schools (KBAS) is made up of seven tuition-free college-preparatory schools that are located in under-served neighborhoods across the Bay Area. With a different website for each of the schools, KBAS did not have a singular point of contact or consistent look for the breadth of information about the schools, enrollment and employment opportunities.

Iron redesigned the web site so that it now serves as a clearinghouse for information and provides a more comprehensive overview of the schools, the Regional Support Office and KIPP as a whole. The integrated CMS gives KBAS complete access to update the content of their site.