Fostering Family Connection

Friendly, professional and distinct. Blue Sky Fostering wanted to “stand out from the crowd.” As briefs go, it was definitely succinct.

At the time, we of course spent some time looking at the Blue Sky website, attending one of their open days, and just getting to know them, as well as trawling through countless other fostering videos.

Together with our brilliant friend and collaborator Paul Hodgkinson, we decided to focus on the importance of family. It was both the new families that fostering creates and also the wider Blue Sky family – the staff, foster parents, families and of course the fostered children.

So returning to the brief, we scripted an idea that revolved around the card game Happy Families. Using lo-fi animation and some studio interviews, together with some location filming, we had the components of a friendly, professional and memorable film.

We pitched the idea, together with an outline script to Blue Sky and their response was very positive.

The Outcome

Here's what the Blue Sky Marketing manager had to say, some two years after the video was signed off:

"We wanted to get the message across what we were all about – being a part of a big family and it was Shedlight that helped us to establish that.They came back to us with the idea that we could use Happy Families as a motif for the video and that worked perfectly for us.

"We really liked the idea, especially with the animations – just making us look really friendly but also really professional and people would be able to trust us. It did really help establish and distinguish ourselves from all the others. [fostering agencies]

"We use the film to recruit foster carers. It is a brilliant starting point for people who were thinking about fostering and about Blue Sky as a company. We still use it all the time.

"The video is brilliant in terms of people understanding what Blue Sky is all about – an that's worth it's weight in gold really because sometimes it's difficult to get those messages across – people tend to remember what they have seen more than what they read."