Akron Children's Hospital: More childhood, please by Marcus Thomas LLC

Happy kids can make anyone smile, and the way Akron Children’s Hospital uses footage from its families helps connect people with the hospital and its care for young kids.

Akron Children’s Hospital and its agency of record, Marcus Thomas, are asking for ‘More childhood, please,’ in an engaging campaign. It argues that with illness, injury, jam-packed family schedules, screen addiction, scary nightly news and online bullying, there are many forces that steal precious time away from childhood.

Using the power of found amateur footage and audio, the campaign celebrates the authentic joys of childhood and reminds audiences not to take a single second of it for granted, while echoing how many parents in 2019 video capture and chart their children’s many milestones. ‘More childhood, please’ features real patients, employee families and kids in the Akron, Ohio community – and the result is a beautifully imperfect, authentic look at childhood as it whizzes past, moment by moment.

A 60-second spot, babies in cute costumes are seen alongside kids playing with pets, dancing at recitals, making faces while eating food they don’t like and getting into mom’s skincare products. Those are seen alongside kids getting care in the hospital. A voice over states that there are good days and bad in childhood, and that the hospital takes care of all kids at all stages of health and development.

Digital radio spots for the campaign were created with found sound recordings of children laughing, singing songs and telling wildly imaginative stories.