Green Buzz Agency | AARP
2020
Role: Head Producer/Director

During the pandemic, AARP seized the opportunity for Hispanic and Latinx communities across the country to connect, provide support, and learn together as we all discover new ways to thrive through this time and beyond. And what better way to connect than through food and music?

AARP asked Green Buzz to, essentially, make the show. In partnership with the AARP team, we created the format, designed a show brand identity from scratch, and produced the live episodes. Green Buzz was just beginning a “pandemic pivot” into livestream and social media video when this big project came along, and so as the head of the project, I was creating a lot of new processes for a successful livestream show as we went.

Over the course of three months, we facilitated 16 live cooking demonstrations and dance parties for 4 different Hispanic/Latinx markets across the country, working with influential Latinx chefs, DJs, and musicians to bring shows to New York, Houston, Los Angeles and Miami. The campaign culminated with huge crossover events for music and cooking, where we brought all four city chefs together to make their own special tamales/pasteles, and the four city DJs/musicians together for a one hour dance party. Our production team fully produced each event, providing technical support, live graphics, and direction for the talent during each stream. The shows were streamed over Facebook live, increasing engagement from each market’s audience and connecting Latinx communities to celebrate what feeds the soul, whether we are in the same place or not.

From the start, it was imperative that each of the cities’ shows were authentic to their own diverse Hispanic and Latinx cultures and communities — communities that varied widely from Houston to LA to NYC to Miami. We wove in closely with the primarily Latinx AARP national and city teams to bring in their perspectives as we built the show identity, from gathering their input on the music themes for each city, to having iterative design sessions for the imagery of each of their cities’ branding. We also had the talent for each of the shows lead with how they wanted to conduct their episodes. The chefs and DJs were free to host their episodes in English, Spanish or both, and all text graphics were shown in both Spanish and English.

The end result was a virtual show that, while streamed under a national umbrella, felt local to each of the cities that participated, and inadvertently attracted viewers not just from around the U.S., but also countries in Central and South America.

The show was renewed for a second season, and as of August 2021, Season 2 currently has the most views of any individual episode or series on AARP’s Spanish Facebook channels, with one recent episode garnering over 25k views.