Industry
Year
Sherwin-Williams
THE LONELIEST COLOR × SHERWIN-WILLIAMS × LEBRON JAMES FAMILY FOUNDATION
THE OPPORTUNITY
Sherwin-Williams names a "Loneliest Color" every year. Their least-tinted, most-overlooked shade, flipped into a statement about picking what you actually want instead of what's popular.
For Year 3, the color was Offbeat Green SW 6706. A vivid, citric lime that had no business being anyone's favorite, and that was the point.
The challenge: make an unloved paint color feel like a movement, and connect it to something bigger than a swatch wall.
THE INSIGHT
Confidence isn't about fitting in. It's about choosing your own lane and standing in it.
That idea only means something if it's attached to real stakes. Sherwin-Williams needed a partner whose story already proved it, not a spokesperson reciting it.
THE STRATEGY
Built and managed a 15-person influencer roster to carry the color and the story across social
Produced ILTHY® limited-edition apparel as a headline sweepstakes prize, sitting alongside a signed LeBron James basketball and a $1,000 Sherwin-Williams gift card
Ran and supported the national release, positioning Offbeat Green inside the PROMISE Project story rather than as a standalone color drop
THE EXECUTION
Merchandising, in-house: Underdogs handled creative design, tech packs, production management, influencer packaging and strategy.
Influencer gifting campaign: Sourced, vetted, and curated hundreds of influencers across art, music, fashion, lifestyle, and culture. Underdogs ran outreach, onboarding, creative briefing, and full campaign management
Custom gifting boxes: Designed two Offbeat Green box builds, a main box carrying a signed basketball and custom Offbeat Green Beats by Dre headphones, and a mini add-on box, plus all print collateral including handwritten notes, then assembled, packed, and shipped every package in-house
Content: Produced early campaign visuals and pitch materials, plus photo and video coverage of campaign moments and product, built for use across Sherwin-Williams, LeBron James Family Foundation, channels
Landing page: Designed and built a custom landing page and web form for Sherwin-Williams Pro customers to register for promotional items
LONG-TERM IMPACT
The Loneliest Color isn't a one-off drop for Sherwin-Williams anymore. It's an annual platform, and Year 3 proved it can carry a cause partnership at the scale of LeBron James without losing the idea at the center of it: pick what's yours, even if nobody else does.
Underdogs and ILTHY® aren't just executing the campaign. We're building the infrastructure Sherwin-Williams uses to make it bigger every year.
