Interlex Communications has one mission, and that’s to make a positive impact in the lives of diverse audiences. If you know anything about the competitive nature of the advertising industry, you might wonder if that business model has any longevity. It does, in fact..

Try 15 years and running. Proof positive that you can do good for others and be successful at the same time exists right here in San Antonio, where Rudy Ruiz co-founded Interlex back in 1995. The firm is one of the only of its kind in the nation (the other being GMMB, the firm that handled President Barack Obama’s presidential campaign run).

Depending on whom you talk to, Interlex could be considered San Antonio’s best kept secret. Over the years, most of its clients have deployed their services in far-flung places like New York, Washington, D.C., Miami and internationally. And while Interlex has done extensive work throughout Texas, most of its clients have historically been based in Austin, Houston and Dallas.

But in the last three years, Interlex has done something that warrants letting the cat out of the bag. During one of the worst economic recessions the United States has faced in the last century, Interlex tripled in staff size and in total billings, and did so with accounts that engage, educate and empower communities and bridge disparities.

No goods, just goodwill.

For most agencies, accounts like this are “nice-to-haves,” but Ruiz has built an institution that is consistently ranked among the top 20 Hispanic advertising agencies in the nation and among the fastest-growing Hispanic companies in the country on accounts that don’t have barcodes associated with them.

To put it simply, doing “good” and selling that “good” well is all they do.

Case in point is Interlex’s work for TracFone Wireless. TracFone is the nation’s largest pre-paid cell phone company.

You think Interlex might simply be selling pre-paid phones? It isn’t.

Tapped for its prowess at building and promoting private/public partnerships to underserved communities, Interlex created and launched from scratch a monumental and groundbreaking new brand for the company. This brand, called “SafeLink,” offers free cell phones and free airtime minutes to low-income households in 30 U.S. states through a partnership with the Federal Communication Commission’s Lifeline program (a federal subsidy that helps families stay connected).

Through this program, Interlex is essentially helping bridge the telecommunications divide in America, to date enrolling more than four million households in America via a campaign that includes TV, radio, billboards, newspapers, online, partnership relations and media relations.

Another client that’s been working with the full-service San Antonio shop since 2007 is American Express.

You think the Interlex creative team is working on credit card designs? It isn’t.

Innovating advocacy marketing for the OPEN division of American Express, the Interlex public relations team is building a network of minority chambers of commerce across the country and educating its small business members on how to grow their companies through federal procurement.

In the process, the team is building coalitions between one of the most recognized brands in the world and one of the fastest growing segments of the American economy – multi-culturally owned small businesses – to expose new revenue streams to minority businesses and empower them with education to survive in a changing economy.

“We’re much more than an ad agency,” Ruiz says. “Advertising is a capability, but it doesn’t fully define us. We are an institution of thought-leaders that leverages policy know-how, cultural insights, behavior change strategies, program development and integrated marketing disciplines to help our clients generate a positive impact on the world while also meeting measurable objectives.

“For private sector clients, those goals tie back to the bottom line in order to make their initiatives sustainable. And for our public sector and non-profit clients, the goals tie back to outcomes measured by research in order to ensure that their resources are being invested wisely as they seek to transform public policy into social action.”

The same line of thinking applies to the fact that the firm is 100 percent Hispanic-owned. It’s a source of pride, and Hispanic marketing is an area of expertise, but it doesn’t encompass Interlex, which is derived from the term, “international lexicon.”

“Sometimes it’s assumed that because we are Hispanic-owned, that’s the kind of marketing we focus on,” Ruiz says. “But we are actually a general market firm that’s multicultural at the core. And, yes, we happen to be Hispanic-owned.

“TracFone is a general market account, but we have to communicate the SafeLink message to a variety of ethnicities and bilingually. We know cultures, but cultures aren’t always affiliated with ethnicity. Being Hispanic is cultural, but so is being a soccer mom, or a senior or a teen. And we’ve connected with all of them and other target audiences around the world through our culturally compelling and emotionally engaging communications campaigns.”

Ruiz left the barrios of Brownsville for the busy streets of Boston in the early ‘80s to earn his bachelor’s in government and master’s in public policy at Harvard University. Upon returning to Texas after completing his education, Ruiz founded Interlex.

In the last 15 years, Interlex has grown from a two-person startup into an international agency with nearly 40 employees, fuelled by the demands of a blue-chip roster of clients like Wyndham Worldwide, the National Education Association and Texas’ Office of the Governor, for whom the agency provided international tourism marketing in places ranging from Latin America and Europe to Canada and Japan.

As the agency of record for the Texas Department of State Health Services, Interlex created several behavior-change campaigns that have been held up as best practices nationally, including initiatives to prevent and reduce smoking, and to increase breastfeeding and immunization rates.

From 2003 to 2008, Interlex helped take Texas’s childhood immunization rate from 65 percent to 78 percent. That led to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to name Texas the most improved state in the nation – and San Antonio/Bexar County as the most improved city and county – as a result.

“When you truly believe in your mission, and that mission is inherently good, you can help people, and in this case – an entire state – do the incredible [and] do the impossible,” Ruiz concludes.

Now that’s a homegrown secret worth sharing with the world.

For more information regarding Interlex’s marketing services, please visit www.interlexusa.com.