“Take Care Down There” Nominated for 2009 Webby Award

PORTLAND, OR —Nominations for the 13^th Annual Webby Awards have been announced and Leopold Ketel & Partners is thrilled to have TakeCareDownThere.org, a micro-site created for Planned Parenthood Columbia Willamette, nominated for such a prestigious award. 

As one of only five nominees in the health category, TakeCareDownThere.org is eligible for the Internet industry’s two most sought-after awards: The Webby Award and The Webby People’s Voice Award, which is voted online by the global Web community. 

Voting is simple:

1.  From now until April 30th, visit pv.webbyawards.com and register to vote.
2.  After registering, you’ll receive an email with a code to activate your account.
3.  Once activated and logged in, click the Web site Ballot.
4.  Scroll down to the Living category; click on Health and you’ll see TakeCareDownThere.org as an option.
5.  Select it and click “cast your vote.”

Hailed as the "Internet's highest honor" by the New York Times, The Webby Awards is the leading international award honoring excellence on the Internet. Nominees are chosen by the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences, a group which includes the likes of Internet co-inventor Vinton Cerf, "Simpson's" creator Matt Groening, musician David Bowie, and Harvey Weinstein.

“As a part of a smaller agency, the creative team at LKP has worked hard to receive recognition for our big ideas,” said Jerry Ketel, president of LKP. “Being nominated for a Webby Award puts LKP in the company of many esteemed industry leaders, and for that we could not be happier.”

Working with Planned Parenthood Columbia Willamette, LKP created TakeCareDownThere.org as a way to reposition the group as caretakers of reproductive health. The interactive Web site includes nine vignettes that help educate teens and young adults in a way that isn’t stuffy or scary. The Web site was intended to disarm people, to make them laugh or smile and to feel like Planned Parenthood was a resource worth recommending to their friends. The site caught the attention not only of young women locally, but also of people all over the world. In the first four months of its launch, nearly 200,000 people visited the campaign’s Web site.

Winners will be announced on May 5, 2009 and honored at a ceremony in New York City on June 8, 2009. Winners are able to share one of the Webby’s famous five-word speeches with the world. Past Webby Award winners – and their speeches - include Al Gore ("Please don't recount this vote."), Beastie Boys ("Can anyone fix my computer?"), and Stephen Colbert ("Me. Me. Me. Me. Me.").

"Nominees like TakeCareDownThere.org are setting the standard for innovation and creativity on the Internet," said David-Michel Davies, executive director of the Webby Awards. "It is an incredible achievement to be selected among the best from the nearly 10,000 entries we received this year."

Planned Parenthood Columbia Willamette (PPCW) is the largest non-profit family planning and reproductive rights organization in Oregon and Southwest Washington. Since 1963, PPCW has successfully carried out its mission of providing, promoting and protecting access to quality reproductive and sexual health care. Each year, approximately 60,000 women, men and teens visit one of PPCW’s eleven health centers. We provide a wide range of education programs and health care services, including low-cost contraceptives, emergency contraception, annual gynecological check-ups, breast exams, cervical cancer detection and treatment, testing and treatment of sexually transmitted diseases, and pregnancy testing and options counseling. Approximately five percent of PPCW’s services are for first term abortion care. For more information, visit http://www.ppcw.org/.