This year, APT Foundation’s Let’s Break Barriers campaign—developed in close collaboration with Red Rock Branding—earned national acclaim across several major creative competitions. While APT has published its own announcement we’re proud to share the story behind the work from the agency side: the strategy, listening, and creative discipline that shaped a message now resonating across the country.

A Campaign Designed to Shift a Narrative

We’ve been working with APT since 2019. This time around, we agreed they needed a fundamental reframing. Opioid use disorder (OUD) isn’t just a long-term rehabilitation issue—it’s an urgent medical condition that deserves immediate, evidence-based care.

Our creative team worked closely with APT clinicians, leadership, and people with lived experience to craft a campaign that would place that truth front and center. The result was Let’s Break Barriers to Treatment, which launched Summer 2025 with:

• a 90-second animated video,
  
• a dedicated landing page anchoring the public message,
  
• and a visual system adapted for billboards, transit placements, and digital channels throughout Greater New Haven during Overdose Awareness Day and National Recovery Month.
  

Every element was built around one life-saving message: methadone is safe, effective, and available today — and no one should have to wait for treatment.

National Awards & Industry Recognition

The campaign’s impact has now been acknowledged by several prestigious creative and healthcare communications competitions. Highlights include:

Davey Awards – Gold & Silver

In categories spanning Healthcare & Wellness and Healthcare & Pharma, the Daveys recognized the campaign’s clarity, design strength, and ability to humanize a stigmatized public health issue.

Viddy Award for Digital Communication

The Viddy Award honored the narrative strength and production quality of the Let’s Break Barriers video—particularly its use of real voices and lived experience to break through common misconceptions about treatment access.

Shorty Awards – Social Impact Finalist

Being named a national finalist places this work alongside campaigns from leading mission-driven organizations across the country. For APT— and for us as creative partners—it underscores the relevance and urgency of focusing on access, dignity, and evidence-based care.

Why This Work Matters

Awards are gratifying, but the driving force behind this project has always been the people APT serves. In our discovery process, we met staff and clients whose stories shaped the tone and direction of the campaign:

• individuals in recovery who trusted us with their lived experience,
  
• family members advocating for faster, more compassionate systems,
  
• and clinicians committed to eliminating every unnecessary barrier between a person and lifesaving medication.
  

Their insight steered us toward a bolder creative stance—one that directly challenges stigma, long wait times, and restrictive policies by emphasizing APT’s open-access model, which you can learn about on a podcast we created for them called Open Access, Open Mic.

Anyone who needs help can walk in and receive care the same day. That truth – and the motivation to shrink wait times from three weeks to three hours – deserved a platform big enough to match its impact.

Collaboration That Makes a Difference

Red Rock Branding is honored to have partnered with APT Foundation on work that blends creative strategy with public health urgency. The recognition from national judging panels is meaningful, but the real win is seeing a message of immediacy and compassion reach the communities that need it most. This is how we live our purpose – Healthy People, Healthy Planet – every day.

Continuing the Momentum

As APT continues expanding this message and advocating for accessible treatment, we’re proud that our creative work plays a role in shifting public understanding. The barriers people face are real — but so are the tools that can save lives today.

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