The Sex Slave Trade

Have you ever noticed that girl in your class or at your workplace who is always by herself? Who always has huge amounts of money in her purse? Who may dress provocatively? Or that girl who may have such a low self-esteem that she's "willing to do anything with anyone?" Teachers, what about the girl in your class who is always tired, late, or has very little attendance and can barely pass your class? If you, as the reader, said "yes" to any of these questions, this next statement may surprise you.

Over half of those girls with any of those symptoms are trafficked and forced into an industry so devious, so crafty, and so dangerous that even the police have just given up on trying to find their instigators. This is the sex slave trade. It comes in many forms and has many names to describe it. There is the porn site or adult magazine, the mail-order bride service, prostitution, and much more. But it only takes one sentence to put all of those different names into perspective. This one: "Many young girls are being sexually exploited all over the world." The scariest part of this is that most are being sold into the U.S. on a daily basis.

A single porn site, alone, makes over $9.65 billion per year off of the bodies of girls who are generally no older than 14 years of age. Think about it. The average girl put into prostitution is 6 years old. We are talking girls who have not enough reached puberty yet. Guess who contributes over half of the percentage of buyers of the sex from these young girls? Americans. This may be hard to believe and even harder to swallow, but it is the truth. It is, rather unfortunately, the cold, hard, and cruel truth of the tragedy.

Most people in America say, "Oh, that's not happening here. That's only happening overseas, in other countries!" Sure, it is happening overseas in other countries, but it is not as prominent there. In America, it is just hiding on the backyards of the very people who believe that statement. It is a heartbreaking reality of our nation.

Do you still think it is such a "great nation?" This nation is so full of sin, exploitation, greed, cruelty, and hurt that no one even notices that girl in class that everyone just thinks is a freak, a slut, or just too shy. But the strong overcome the weak, right? So, what are you going to do to help these poor girls? Nothing. Are you just going to sit there and say, "Oh no! How can this happen! That's so terrible!" ? Or are you going to do something about it? I know I am.

Spread the word!
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All information  pertaining to numbers, symptoms, and events provided in this blog post are courtesy of Run For Freedom and its affiliates.

Two Great Advertising Agencies!!

Below are listed two very good and very different advertising agencies in the Tampa Bay area that I have taken the liberty to profile for new and upcoming advertisers:

22squared


    Locations: Atlanta, Georgia and Tampa, Florida

    Agency Summary: They advertise that they have "Exponential ideas for exponential results." The make big brand ideas that are used to spark conversation in the public at large and this turns customers into advocates. A popular campaign that they use is "Work That Talks ®." They have work that will go everywhere. They know how to make people talk about a company or product and how to bring it up to the front of their minds whenever they want to use a similar product. They offer summer internships at both the Atlanta and Tampa offices. More to know is that they are one of the biggest independent agencies in the US Southeast and the fifth biggest agency in the entire USA.

    Agency Website: www.22squared.com

    Types of Internships Offered: They offer internships in each one of these departments: brand planning, campaign management, client leadership, client performance, creative/design, human resources, information technology, media buying, search (SCOUT 22), and social media.

    Size of Agency: They said in 2009 that they had 294 employees total.

    Client List: The client list includes Toyota, Florida's Natural, Buffalo Wild Wings, Dunkin' Donuts, and Publix with a total of 20 companies in all.

    Agency History: Starting out, the company was founded in 1922 by James A. Greene, but only the Atlanta office. It was named WestWayne at the time. The name change to 22squared did not happen until 2009. Their accomplishments begin with going from $1 million in 1938 to $570 million by 2009. They won the 2010 HOW Logo Design for their creation of the Thomas & Gray Finer Things logo. They were also named the Best Agency for Social Media in 2011. As far as failures, the companies must be very good at covering them up or they have an excellent PR department, because I could not find any information on any failures of any kind.

    Agency Image: Their slogan is rather long and lengthy, but it all comes down to one concept: "We are NOT the same." They are also saying things such as these: "NOT typical," "NOT dreading tax season" (one of their clients is Jackson-Hewitt), "NOT the happiest place on Earth" (the title already in use by their Costa Rica client), "NOT easily categorized," and "NOT marketing to the 1&." Basically, they are new, innovative, exciting, abnormal, and different (all, of course, in good ways).

(Disclaimer: this information was gathered from the following sites: the 22squared main website, AdBrands.net, the 22squared slideshare, and 22squared History)

Pinstripe Marketing

    Location: St. Petersburg, Florida

    Agency Summary: They do marketing for many different kinds of companies. The list goes as follows: law, finance, healthcare, architecture, engineering, and construction, technology, education, government, travel, tourism, and non-profit. A popular campaign would have to be the Shrine Game. They help organize a basketball game where all of the proceeds go to help all of the children at the Shrine Hospitals. There are many departments within the organization, including branding, advertising, media buying, research, web design, mobile apps/games, strategy, social media, public relations, business administration, and the executives. More to know is that they give back to their community in any way that they can. They do give this support in the form of pro bono work, voluntarism, and fundraising to these organizations, SPCA Tampa Bay's 3k Petwalk, SPCA Tampa Bay's Petbowl, the 600 Block of St. Pete & Crislip Arcade, Stop Pet Overpopulation (SPOT), Community Law Program, Brookwood Florida, Lupus Foundation of Florida, and Guardian ad Litem Foundation.

    Agency Website: www.pinstripemarketing.com

    Types of Internships Offered: They offer free, summer internships at the St. Petersburg office.

    Size of Agency: Fortune 500 companies and AmLaw 100 firms, but only a handful of employees by itself.

    Client List: The client list includes these five companies: The Yerrid Law Firm, Harvard Jolly Architecture, Xerox, Trend Micro, and Tech Data, only naming a few. They serve fifteen companies in all.

    Agency History: Starting out, the company was founded in 1998 with the idea that one size fits one. It was initially created to serve law firms. However, it quickly grew into a full-service marketing and communication agency. Their accomplishments include seven major awards. In 2008, they were listed as #104 on the Top 500 Emerging Businesses in the US by diversitybusiness.com, but also in that year received the award as the SCORE Client of the Year. In 2009, their creative team received two Addy Awards. In 2010, they were given the Historic Preservation Award and the president, Ginger Reichl, was named the Game-Changer of the year by Business Busdies Tampa Bay. In 2011, they were given a Telly Award for their video work as well as being listed as on of the 75 largest woman-owned companies by the Business Journal. Only one failure was found. It was a commercial made for SPCA. It was listed in the 2011 Top Marketing Failures.

    Agency Image: Their slogan is "Tailored marketing solutions." They advertise that they make "customized marketing plans to meet the unique needs of every client" by using a "custom mix of tools." They say that they "work to understand your business, your competitors, and your clients." Basically, the image they are trying to portray is that they are familiarly distinct, business-like, and clean.

(Disclaimer: this information was gathered from the following sites: the Pinstripe Marketing main site, the Pinstripe Marketing LinkedIn, and the Pinstripe Marketing Facebook)

I have also listed below the links to the Prezi presentations that I have made with my research:

• 22squared Prezi
• Pinstripe Marketing Prezi

Comment on this post if you read all way down to here. And thank you if you read all the way down to here! 

Have a great day!