1,000 ATMs and Nobody Knew

In the spring of 2020, hundreds of laid-off New Yorkers stood in line for hours on a single Manhattan block, in the heat, during a pandemic, to reach unemployment money they had already earned.

The state paid benefits onto KeyBank debit cards. KeyBank had one open branch in the city, one ATM, on East 22nd Street. So people waited, two and three hours at a time, for money that was already theirs.

The Times and the Post covered it. The Borough President wrote the Governor. What nobody mentioned: it was completely preventable.

The gap

Allpoint had more than 1,000 surcharge-free ATMs across the city, over 100 in Manhattan alone. Walgreens, CVS, Rite Aid. Some within walking distance of that line. The KeyBank cards worked at every one of them. The information existed, buried in card fine print and on a state website few could navigate. Nobody told the people who needed it.

It was an information gap. And information gaps are a creative problem.

The work

Put the information where the people were, in a form they could act on in five seconds, delivered by people who could answer a question on the spot.

I led creative direction and asset production: wayfinding and printed materials pointing people to nearby ATMs, bilingual and built for street level, plus the street teams who intercepted people before they joined the line and the digital and paid search that extended the reach. The direction was deliberately restrained. Big type, clear message, the KeyBank and Allpoint marks people needed to trust it, and no hierarchy beyond what someone had to read and act on. Knowing when to hold a brand back and let function lead is a harder skill than knowing how to make it loud. Here it was the only honest choice.

The impact

$17M in partner revenue over the run. 1,000+ surcharge-free locations made visible. 13 months of sustained street presence through crisis and recovery.

Coverage in the New York Times and New York Post, responses from the Borough President and the Department of Labor, and the visible shrinking of the East 22nd Street line marked the shift from crisis to resolution.