Virginia Department of
Criminal Justice Services

Teen Suicide Prevention

The Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services asked us to take on a deeply important mission: preventing suicide among teens and young adults. Their challenge to us was clear—make the message bolder, more relatable, and impossible to ignore. It was time to pull the conversation about suicide into the open and equip Gen Z with the tools to ask the hard questions that could save a friend’s life—or their own.

We knew that to truly connect, the message had to be short, direct, and woven into the types of content young people already engage with every day.

Instead of leaning on the typical dark, somber tone often used in suicide prevention campaigns, we flipped the script—creating a vibrant, upbeat look and feel that invited openness instead of avoidance. Drawing inspiration from social media challenges, we built a peer-to-peer concept around the #bestfriendschallenge. It looks familiar and fun at first glance, but beneath the surface, it encourages real, potentially life-saving conversations.