Vehr is celebrating its 10^th anniversary this week. This is, indeed, an important milestone for us. I plan to use a few blog posts in the coming days to look forward and to celebrate. Let’s start with the celebration part … just because.

How we celebrate is very important. We knew that our celebration had to be a reflection of who we are and what matters to us as communications professionals, and as people. We care about each other, our communities and people who live within them.

So, to celebrate 10 years in business, we’ve decided to initiate a program to donate our services and support local nonprofits in ways that can make a real difference. It’s called the Vehr Cares program, and it has two parts:

Vehr Cares in the community: Several times a year, we’ll turn off our phones, close our emails and put work on hold, if only for a bit, to donate our time and resources to those in need.

Vehr seeks out meaningful opportunities to give back. From an evening spent crafting with children at the Ronald McDonald House to an afternoon serving at a local shelter, these projects are flexible, informal and allow us to interact with the communities we care about. This is far from new to us, as we engage in such activities fairly regularly, but we’re putting it in writing to make it part of who we are and celebrate our growth as an agency.

Vehr Cares nonprofit grant: Each year, we will donate up to $50,000 in professional services to two nonprofit organizations ($25,000 each). One of the nonprofits we support will have an arts-related purpose reflecting our belief that art matters and that it is a core strength in our community and in our lives.

Our donated services can be used for anything from developing an integrated and strategic communications plan, to supporting the implementation of an existing plan or even providing our varied and diverse graphic and digital design services.

Organizations must apply for this grant program and they must demonstrate that they have the marketing budget and/or professional marketing staff capacity to sustain any plan we develop or project we deliver. As of today, we’re accepting applications from arts-related nonprofits for a grant that will be awarded this spring. Please visit our Vehr Cares page on for more details and to apply.

I like that we celebrate this way. I like that we are stepping-up to do even more, and in a more structured way, to kick-off our next decade of service. Cheers to the future.