Working Their Assets

Unabashedly liberal long-distance phone company Working Assets has decided it’s time to be noticed, and released its first TV spot via North Woods Advertising.

“We thought that television should be the next step in getting the word out,” said Robin Lee Greiner, client vp of marketing, “particularly with a new administration in the White House coming out every day with proposals that roll back so much of what has been achieved in the past 20 years.”

The San Francisco-based company, which donates 25 percent of its revenue to causes that support nonprofits, chose the Minneapolis shop, best known for Ralph Nader’s controversial “Priceless” spoof, for its political sensibility.

“They understood us, both as a business and how integral politics and activism is to us,” she said.

Via a split screen, the ad shows a woman walking into her kitchen on the left, while a logger cuts down a tree on the right. As she begins talking on the phone, the tree goes back up.

“Just by doing something every day, you can make a difference for environmental or social causes without costing you extra money,” Greiner said.

The ad broke in late April and is running in test markets Minneapolis and Portland, Ore.