City of Chicago

When COVID vaccines became available to teens, uptake in Chicago lagged behind other age groups, with fewer than 40% vaccinated after six months. Many teens felt COVID wouldn’t affect them, and conversations about vaccination were especially limited in Black and Brown communities. Our goal was to get vaccination rates to 70% by making the experience something teens actually wanted to be part of.

Traditional advertising wasn’t going to cut through, so we leaned into FOMO. Teens who got vaccinated could receive a personalized NFT portrait, created in partnership with celebrity photographer Sandro Miller. Inside a custom mobile studio, teens shared their hopes for the future while AI transformed their words into one-of-a-kind artwork, turning each vaccination into a unique digital keepsake.

To reach the communities with the lowest vaccination rates, the studio traveled across Chicago for more than two months. The resulting portraits appeared everywhere teens spent their time—from murals and projections to Snapchat, TikTok, Instagram, Twitch, and Spotify—creating a movement that encouraged others to get vaccinated too.

The campaign generated more than 340 million impressions, increased vaccine interest by 2,000%, and helped drive Chicago's teen vaccination rate to nearly 85%, well above the national average of 68%.