The Power of a Story

Trey SchwabOutreach Coordinator, UW Organ and Tissue Donation

Barb GlammanDonor Mother

Pete CashmanLiver Recipient

Background

• Both parties went through our standard follow-up program following their donation and transplant

• Both parties wanted to meet each other so the proper consent forms were signed and contact information was provided to both parties so that they could arrange to meet

The Journey

• During the process of corresponding and eventually meeting, they learned that Amy’s family members were Packers fans, while Pete was a Bears season ticket holder

• Out of this, an idea was born for a media story

The Local Story

• Pete reached out to his local newspaper to tell them about their story and they ran an article about the Packers-Bears connection

• The article turned out really well and caught the attention of a national sports writer from Sporting News magazine

The National Story

• That writer tracked down Pete and Barb for an interview and wrote his article about their story and the unique connection between the two families. It ran in Sporting News magazine

• As that story went to print, Pete started working with UW Public Affairs to pitch the story to other regional/national media

• Gian Galassi from UW Public Affairs was pitching the story when he got a call from a producer from NBC Sports

• NBC was televising the Packers – Bears game on Christmas night 2011 and they wanted to feature this story on the broadcast

• Very tight timeline to coordinate this, get both parties filmed, and to film a meeting between everyone prior to the game

• Thanks to everyone’s cooperation and Gian’s hard work and coordination – NBC got their story done in time to air on the game as planned

The Impact

• NBC Sunday Night Football has been the highest rated show on television for the past two seasons

• Christmas Night game between the Packers and Bears was the highest rated Sunday night game ever until that time with over 24 million people watching

• Regional ratings – 48.6% of the televisions in Wisconsin were watching that game and 29.2% of the televisions in Illinois were watching

• National ratings – just over 15% of the televisions in the US were watching that game