Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Ben and Jerry's April Fools Website Revealed

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Local Firm Vermont Design Works Partners with Ben and Jerry’s on Cloned Milk “April Fools” Website

Burlington, VT, April 1, 2009 - For the past week, a website for “Cyclone Dairy” (www.CycloneDairy.com), a company that allegedly produces milk from cloned cows, has been the subject of intense speculation in the blogosphere: are the company and the website real? Are consumers really drinking milk from cloned cows?

This morning the website was revealed to be an “April Fools” joke by Ben and Jerry’s, intended toraise awarenss that food from clones could be in our food supply and consumer have the right to know. Milk from cloned cows is in fact approved for consumer consumption by the FDA and does not have to be labeled as such on food packaging.

The website was created by local web and graphic design firm Vermont Design Works (www.VermontDesignWorks.com).

“When Ben and Jerry’s came to us with this idea, our entire team was excited by it,” says Vermont Design Works owner Andrew Allen. “We have a long history of working with Ben and Jerry’s and with other socially responsible companies. This fit right in with our mission.”

The challenge in designing the site, says Vermont Design Works’ Director of Web Strategy Craig Chevrier, “was to make what looked almost like a perfectly legitimate corporate site, but hinted at activism. We had to strike just the right balance so that when the truth was revealed, it would all make sense.”

“Once bloggers found the site, it took off like wildfire,” says Allen. “We’ve had a great time following the online forums. People were speculating that it was animal rights groups, Food and Water Watch, etc.. But all the buzz has done exactly what it was intended to do – to create awareness and get people thinking seriously about an important issue affecting our food supply. We are proud to be a part of this project.”


For more information about Vermont Design Works’ involvement in the Cyclone Dairy project, please contact cyclone@vtdesignworks.com or call 802.383.7679. For more information about Ben and Jerry’s anti-cloning mission, visit www.cyclonedairy.com, where videos and activism links were posted this morning.

Vermont Design Works was founded in 1999 to help businesses and non-profit organizations build a presence in the marketplace and on the web by offering a full range of graphic design and website development services. The company jumped into the Vermont business community with a big splash by designing the 2000 summer marketing campaign for Ben and Jerry’s ice cream. Since then, Vermont Design Works has created hundreds of successful websites and graphic design projects for large and small businesses and nonprofits, including Nantucket Nectars, Equipe Sport, New England Naturals, GlobalZ Data Processing, and Gardeners Supply “Flower Power” Fundraising.

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