The Illinois Farm Families coalition won a Best of Show award in the consumer category last week at the National Agri-Marketing Association 2024 AgriMarketing Conference in Kansas City.
The Best of NAMA awards program honors the best of the best work in ag communications; companies and agencies must first qualify through regional competition to advance to the national level.
The Best of Show award was given for a 30-second commercial first aired during the Super Bowl 2023 as the official kickoff of the We Are the 96% campaign produced by IFF.
The commercial, The Corporation, features Illinois farmer Chad Bell and his family. The video juxtaposes the family farm against a typical corporation, giving Bell’s 7-year-old son the title of “Procurement” and the family dog the position of “Human Resources.”
“There’s a big misconception in agriculture that the family farm is gone, and everything now is corporate farming, and things aren’t the way it used to be,” said Bell, a sixth-generation farmer who, along with his family, raises pigs, corn, soybeans, hay and wheat on their Viola farm. “Yes, farming has changed. Farms have gotten larger, and there are fewer farmers, but in the end, the vast majority of farms — 96 percent of farms in Illinois — are still made up of families, even if they look a little different today.”
The We Are the 96% campaign featured 25 farm families from across Illinois doing the things that families do — mentoring their kids, teaching new skills, going to work, and coming home — but in a rural Illinois setting. The campaign’s goal is to help people not involved in agriculture understand that most farms are run by families that aren’t that different from their own.
“We’re very honored to have been part of this campaign,” said Bell. “I’m really happy to be somebody who can help promote Illinois farm families through this campaign and on social media to help others realize that we are the family farm and we’re still alive and kicking.” Bell shares his passion for his everyday life on the farm on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.
»Related: Illinois farm families to again be featured in Super Bowl commercial
