2024 Small Agency Awards

Civic Entertainment Group is Small Agency of the Year, Experiential, Gold

By Gillian Follett. Published on July 24, 2024.

Civic Entertainment Group sent Ford CEO Jim Farley (pictured with his son) on a three-day road trip to meet employees and consumers and visit dealerships. Credit: Ford

Even before launching Civic Entertainment Group, Co-Founders David Cohn and Stuart Ruderfer teamed to create attention-grabbing campaigns—such as when the two were working for New York City’s Parks Department and organized an Arbor Day funeral service for a tree that had been chopped down.

Years later, their agency brings the same knack for crafting compelling experiential campaigns and brand activations to clients including Audible, Ford, Verizon, Peacock and Meta. Civic added Canva, Shopify and Wyndham Hotels & Resorts to that roster in 2023, and picked up another new client, digital security service Aura, in the first few months of 2024.

Civic prioritizes immersive storytelling in the experiences it creates for clients. Last August, for instance, the agency sent Ford CEO Jim Farley on a three-day road trip in one of the automaker’s F-150 Lightning electric trucks to visit Ford employees, customers and dealerships across the southwest. His journey was documented in Ford’s “On The Road” video series, which reached more than 150 million consumers across social media.

The agency also helped Verizon launch its “5G Innovation Sessions” conference series, which rejected the corporate blandness of typical conferences and instead organized the events at venues where Verizon’s network already operated—such as SoFi Stadium and Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas, home of the Texas Rangers baseball team. The sessions highlighted new Verizon-powered innovations such as facial recognition for venue access and drone technology. The conference series generated 641 new customer leads for Verizon, according to Civic.

The agency also spearheaded Canva’s “Brandega” activation at Advertising Week New York last October, which surpassed Canva’s attendance target by 58% and drove more than 1,500 new leads for the graphic design platform.

On top of expanding its business to new clients, the agency recently launched a new accessibility practice helmed by Cohn, who is deaf, to help brands ensure their campaigns or new products resonate with the 25% of U.S. adults who have a disability.