As many of our supporters know, we have a very limited resource of funds which includes, our own pockets and any donations, sold merchandise, and web ads we receive. Although this project is almost finished with its first year, we are still in the beginning stages of development and as they say, necessity breeds ingenuity. This brings us to our newest and one of our more unique campaigns, "Soldier-on-Assignment". We currently have a soldier heading out to one of the theaters (OPSEC) and he is agreed, during his downtime and not to conflict with his military duties, to be a "Soldier-on-Assignment". In return for his valuable contributions, The Graffiti of War Project is going to use our marketing funds to help his stay in country a bit better with care packages, DVDs, and other items of comfort. In the past, we have been using these funds to supply MWR facilities across both theaters our materials (brochures, posters, etc) as well as paying for advertising in newspapers and magazines with high military readership. After our first "conventional" campaign, we realized there must be a better way. This is that better way. For starters, we would rather have most of our "marketing" funds to end up in the hands of those we respect and admire, the military service member and not some corporate giant, that receive enough of our money anyway. Also, our goal has been to document images not well known to others and having one of our brothers or sisters-in-arms out there getting the obscure images is perfect for this project. Finally, their contributions will be featured on our site, in this soon to be completed page. Now, just to be clear, we will not be disclosing unit details, locations, etc for obvious OPSEC concerns. Their safety and the safety of their unit and the US Armed Forces is our utmost concern. We will NOT under any circumstances divulge any even remotely sensitive information, OPSEC is important not for just those in the military but for those in any sort of contact with the military. That being said, we feel this will generate some great buzz and interest in our site and the overall project concept and subsequent foundation.
We have already been able to recruit one "Solder-on-Assignment" but we need many more. In addition, we also need "Marine-on-Assignments", "Airmen-on-Assignments", "Sailor-on-Assignments", this program is available to all military and civilian contractor personnel located in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kuwait. No matter what branch, job, home or location, we need them!! And this is where YOU, wonderful, loyal and committed supporters of The Graffiti of War Project come in. We need you to spread the word to those brave men and women that are currently deployed or are heading in that direction. Be sure to let them know that the Project will be sponsoring them and providing them with custom ordered care packages, items from our merchandise page, DVDs, and other items of comfort for their willingness to, not just contribute, but be on Assignment.
For the supporter that doesn't have access to service members who are deployed or heading for deployment, you can still do your part by donating to our partner non-profit, JoeOnTheMove.org (501(c)(3)), purchase merchandise from our website, of if that is too much (and with this economy, we completely understand) then you can spread the word to your friends, family and co-workers, heck, anybody for that matter, your bus driver, your barber, your banker (yeah hit him up for some money, they are always doing it to us!) strangers, absolutely anyone. I've said it before and I will keep saying it, without individual help from good people like our supporters, we will never have enough to complete this important cultural project.
Going forward, as always if you have any questions please feel free to contact Doc, Andi or Mel and we will be happy to assist you in any way we can. We look forward to the results of this campaign and to the content we receive from our S-o-A's. We hope you enjoy the photos and that you get a better understanding of life deployed to Southwest Asia.