PRSA 2012 Silver Anvil Winner - The Power of the Purple Purse: Talking About Domestic Violence

This year PRSA partnered with Inside PR, a weekly podcast about public relations and social media, hosted by Gini Dietrich in Chicago, Joseph Thornley in Ottawa and Martin Waxman in Toronto and produced by Thornley Fallis to get behind the scenes interviews with several Silver Anvil finalists.

This year the Allstate Foundation and Fleishman-Hillard received a Silver Anvil Award for their campaign, "The Power of the Purple Purse: Talking About Domestic Violence." Inside PR's Dietrich interviewed Patricia Garza, director, strategic philanthropy at the Allstate Foundation and Christine Heath, managing supervisor at Fleishman-Hillard.

It’s hard to believe that domestic violence affects one in four women in their lifetime, or that it strikes women more than 145 times each hour in the U.S. But it’s even harder for women to talk about it. That is why the Allstate Foundation decided to take action by launching the Purple Purse campaign in partnership with the YWCA USA. The campaign focused on building a collaborative community that would help share information and resources to make it easier to talk about domestic violence. Through an online resource disguised as a shopping magazine, The Foundation sparked conversation that has only continued with time.

Garza explained, "The Allstate Foundation's research indicates that about 75% of Americans think that [domestic violence] is an issue that needs to be talked about but only a third of us have actually talked to anybody else about it."

For more pre-ceremony footage of the Allstate Foundation and Fleishman-Hillard before their big win, check out the video interview.