Client: The Peebles Corporation and the McKissack Group
Project: Affirmation Tower – a planned supertall skyscraper in Manhattan to be located at the 1.2-acre vacant plot at 418 11th Avenue, one of the city’s last remaining vacant lots. Upon completion, Affirmation Tower would be the tallest building in the western hemisphere and New York’s first majority Black developed, designed and constructed project.
Challenge: The Peebles Corporation responded to a Request-for-Proposal for Manhattan’s Site K, located across from the Jacob Javits Convention Center, to build Affirmation Tower. The Peebles Corporation enlisted Relevance to elevate Affirmation Tower’s presence in the public eye, position the project as a must-have for Manhattan‘s real estate landscape and emphasize its historical and cultural significance.
Solution: Relevance launched a campaign spanning print and broadcast coverage as well as in-person events and social media to publicize Affirmation Tower and the ongoing status of the Site K RFP. As part of this campaign, Relevance secured numerous speaking opportunities for Don Peebles, Founder and CEO of The Peebles Corporation, who was able to maintain a steady presence on prominent broadcast networks and top-tier publications to discuss the economic and social importance of Affirmation Tower. The social media strategy brought the Affirmation Tower brand and mission to a wider audience, creating conversation online about the need for representation in the New York skyline for minority and women-owned businesses. To date, this enhanced and widespread media presence resulted in Affirmation Tower being considered as the new headquarters for the Mid-Manhattan NAACP, which remains the case once the project is completed.
Results:
- Relevance maintained Affirmation Tower’s presence in the news cycle, including securing several speaking opportunities for the Peebles Corporation’s CEO Don Peebles on networks such as NBC, FOX News and CBS.
- Due to continuous media coverage, Affirmation Tower and the fate of Site K was significant talking point during the 2022 gubernatorial election.
- Affirmation Tower was selected as a potential headquarters for the NAACP’s Mid-Manhattan chapter.
- Developed online and broadcast profile and discourse that helped elevate the voices of minority- and women-owned businesses and underline the importance of their representation in New York’s real estate industry across multiple platforms.