Energy
Digital design and print
Tullow Oil – Building Futures
Client
Tullow Oil
Sector
Energy
Service
Stakeholder engagement
Format
Digital design and print
Year
2013
Stock
Uncoated recycled
Audience
Communities and local businesses
Award
Gold, WorldMediaFestival 2014
The brief
When an oil company arrives, most people picture engineers and petrol.
As Tullow weighed development after its 2012 discovery in Kenya’s South Lokichar Basin, the communities nearby had almost no picture of what an operation actually needs, which is caterers, farmers, drivers, security and service businesses long before it needs anyone on a rig. Tullow’s field teams needed something clear and engaging to put in people’s hands at the very first meeting, wherever the company arrived next.
The opportunity
Don’t explain the industry. Map the opportunity, honestly.
The booklet treats the supply chain as a jigsaw, an idea we developed and ran throughout, with every piece a real place a local business or worker could occupy: catering, farming, security, vocational training. It made one point on every page: whoever you are, there’s a piece with your name on it. And it told the truth about the pieces that don’t exist, stating plainly that production creates few direct jobs and that the real, lasting opportunities sit in the supply chain around the operation.
The work
A twenty-page booklet built for the field.
We developed the concept, the jigsaw illustration and the design: a hand-drawn town where every business, airstrip and farm included, slots into the operation as a puzzle piece. A life cycle spread walks readers through where opportunity actually sits at each stage, from exploration to restoration. Printed on uncoated recycled stock, it feels plain and understated on purpose, in keeping with what it says. No gloss, no spin.
The impact
Printed in 2013. Still the reference.
Building Futures gave Tullow’s teams a way to open new-country engagement with something concrete: a map of where people fit, with no promises attached. It won Gold in the Corporate Print category at the WorldMediaFestival 2014, and more than a decade on it’s still pulled out as the reference for local content communication, its illustration approach reused in work for other operators since.
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