On January 25, 2011, President Barack Obama gave his State of the Union address. Usually this would have little or no impact on our work day, however, a particular segment of his speech stood out to one of our clients and spurred a flurry of projects.

What did the American President say that was so exciting?

We live and do business in the Information Age, but the last major reorganization of the government happened in the age of black-and-white TV. There are 12 different agencies that deal with exports. There are at least five different agencies that deal with housing policy. Then there’s my favorite example: The Interior Department is in charge of salmon while they’re in fresh water, but the Commerce Department handles them when they’re in saltwater. (Laughter.) I hear it gets even more complicated once they’re smoked. (Laughter and applause.)

I know that it’s hard to picture me getting excited about salmon, but when it comes to smoked salmon, Bradley Smoker happens to be a lot of fun. When Adam from Maple North pitched the idea of the Department of Smoked Salmon and his rough drafts at us the day after the State of the Union, the three of us started on what might go down in the books as the project of the year.

We created a landing page, press release, banner ads, official seals & buttons and launched the Department of Smoked Salmon less than 8 hours later.

I won’t lie, the tagline “Don’t let bureaucracy blow smoke on your salmon!” might still be making me laugh over a month later. See, proof that work can (and should!) be fun.

Meanwhile, the badges and buttons have become a Bradley Smoker forum favourite. You can spot them in board signatures!