Last month, the Grand Valley State University Advertising Team made university history after winning its division in the District 6 American Advertising Federation National Student Advertising Competition. With 20 universities from Michigan, Indiana and Illinois combined competition at the competition in early April, the District 6 competition was one of the largest NSAC competitions in the nation.

25 advertising/PR majors from GVSU worked for two semesters on the required task for the competition – an advertising campaign for Nissan.

“This has been a crazy ride,” said Patrick Vander Kolk, the team’s account executive, in a press release. “Our team has invested over 10,000 hours the past 32 weeks toward this end, and it’s surreal to think that all of those hours paid off. From day one, the 25 of us have believed that our ideas can add value to the Nissan brand. From day one, the 25 of us have believed that our ideas can add value to the Nissan brand. I’m glad the judges recognized that today.”

With affiliate professor Frank Blossom as advisor and coach, the GVSU team was made up of five student presenters – Vander Kolk, Amanda Villarreal, Gabriel Carter, Ashlie Wignet and Elizabeth Miedema – who pitched the campaign to judging teams comprised of advertising professionals and Nissan marketing executives.

The team will present again in Austin, Texas at the National Championship this week.

“Words cannot express how proud I am of every single member of our team,” Vander Kolk said. “It’s a competitive district, and we have shown yet again that the caliber of students at Grand Valley can hang with anyone. And we’re not done yet. We’re planning on bringing home first place from the national competition this June.”

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