GRAND RAPIDS, Mich.–The winners of the 9th Annual Video Contest hosted by CU*Answers have been named in the categories of Best Video Idea, Best 30-Second Spot Idea, and Best Completed Video.
For the first time ever, CU*Answers said it selected four winning entries instead of three. The winning contributors, all employees of credit unions on the CU*BASE core processing platform, each won $1,500 for their credit union plus an Amazon Echo.
The theme for this year’s contests was “Online Retailing 2.0 – Redefining Everything Credit Union,” and CU*Answers reported 35 total entries received from credit union employees. CU*Answers also produced its own Industry Short with Fulvew Productions using the same theme. All winning videos premiered on the big screen for the attendees at CU*Answers Leadership Conference held at the JW Marriott in Grand Rapids, Mich.
The winners are:
- Best Video Idea – Julie Stevens, Kellogg Community Federal Credit Union
- Best 30-Second Video Idea – Kathy Fearnley, Lakeshore Federal Credit Union
- Best Completed Video – Jamie Richter, Heartland Credit Union
- Best Completed Video – Julie Stevens, Kellogg Community Federal Credit Union
This year’s winning videos can be viewed online at http://lc2016.cuanswers.com or view a full collection of videos CU*Answers has produced for credit unions to use on their website, lobby monitors, and some suited for television broadcast at www.cuatv.com. Be sure to click on the Industry Short link as well at http://cuatv.com/category/industry-shorts/.
Separately, at CU*Answers’ Leadership Conference, rkGoBig, a collaboration of credit unions in the eastern U.S. headquartered in Harrisburg, Penn., was named the winner of the 6th annual “Spirit of CU*Answers” award.
rkGoBig is a CUSO started by six credit unions in the eastern U.S. Based on the work of Mid-Atlantic Corporate FCU’s Rekindle Initiative (rekindlecu.org), the foundation of the business is to help save the small credit union. Peter Barnard, rkGOBig CEO and facilitator, accepted the award, along with four of the six rkGoBig credit union founding partners who were also present at the conference, which was held in Grand Rapids, Mich. According to Barnard, “Our first tactic is to address the very real limits of our size in a market that increasingly values large scale. We believe that only through collaboration can we achieve the scale efficiency and reduced costs critical to survival.”
The Spirit of CU*Answers award, established in 2011, recognizes a client credit union for excellence in a variety of areas. In addition to the focus on collaboration and cooperation exemplified by this year’s winner, the award also allows the CUSO to recognize credit unions who have strong volunteer programs, who’ve demonstrated particularly strong execution and performance or a high level of adoption of CU*Answers tools, who have found new ways to demonstrate commitment to the 7 Cooperative Principles, or who’ve started new businesses in the network.