What a fantastic end to an incredible journey! The last visit of the PlaidNation tour was at Launch Pad, a New Orleans based co-working environment where entrepreneurs, freelancers and creative professionals share collaborative workspace downtown.

LaunchPad is one of a few new, up and coming places where entrepreneurs are setting up shop and bringing New Orleans back to life. There's an incredible sense of community within the internet/creative/developer/freelancer population of NOLA, and the energy is inviting. There's also some sweet new tax incentives that are helping business people set their operations up here.

The Launchpad visit was a virtual interview-love-fest. We interviewed LaunchPad, they interviewed us. We interviewed Tiffany Starnes, and she interviewed us. And then we joined Jeremy Wright and Katie Del Guercio on the live LaunchPadTV show!

Thanks to Chris Schultz, Tiffany Starnes and the LaunchPad crew for a great end of tour visit!

The Make It Right Foundation was at the top of our list for visits while in New Orleans. Having seen photos of the stunning architecture and build plans for the lower 9th Ward, we couldn't wait to share the story.

Upon arrival to Tennessee Street, you can't help but be moved. It's heart wrenching to see the devastation, the abandoned lots, the spray painted warnings outside of still empty homes. And it's awe inspiring to see a street filling with abundance and hope. Construction vehicles move continuously up and down the street, from project to project. Residents are moving in.

The Make It Right Foundation is building several homes on Tennessee Street. These are no ordinary homes. These homes are LEED Platinum certified, have been built to survive future hurricanes similar to or worse than Katrina, and have been designed by some of the most prominent architects from around the globe.

We chatted with Executive Director Tom Darden about what the Make It Right Foundation is up to, the fashion-like trend curves of brand awareness that disaster or event oriented non-profits deal with, and what's in the future for the organization.

See the interview with Executive Director Tom Darden and Robert, a Tennessee Street resident who just moved into his new Make it Right home, on the PlaidNation wrap up video for New Orleans.

While in Jackson, Mississippi, we stopped at NunoErin, a new company founded by Nuno and Erin.

They design and produce furniture and installations that promote interactions between people and objects. If you're re-working your space, redesigning a client's space or looking for something really unique to get people talking about your space or event, you need to see this.

Their products include:
+ Wall panels that react to human touch (like those 80's t-shirts times TEN.)
+ Stools, lounges and other furniture that react to body temperature, sunlight and touch
+ Pillows that promote human interaction and touch

They've also created a system for sustainable lighting of outdoor surfaces like concrete and pavement using bio luminescent organisms. These don't require power and could be used for temporary or permanent installations. Possibilities include:
+ Lighting streets and sidewalks for events, with custom colors and design
+ Way-finding graphics for flood-prone areas (like New Orleans) that don't require power or structures (imagine roads that glow in the dark to help trapped citizens find their way to safety.)

We fell in love with Nuno & Erin, their incredible studio and the possibilities that their work bring to the architectural, interior design and event industries. We think you will, too.

See video of Nuno, Erin and the NunoErin products in action on the wrapup video for Jackson, Mississippi. Definitely needs to be seen to be believed!

While in Memphis, we had the opportunity to meet another agency - Red Deluxe, who are local faves in the Memphis creative community.

Sporting clients like the Red Cross and the American Lung Association, Red Deluxe is clearly at the forefront of the non-profit industry.

While non-profits aren't their entire business (we just missed a meeting with the Memphis Grizzlies) this is an area where they lead the pack. Non-profits who work with the Deluxe team get the same Deluxe action and experience that their commercial clients enjoy.

That's one of the many lessons that they shared with us during our meeting at their agency, too. Plenty of non-profits take the attitude of "we can't" or "it's not appropriate" because they're a non-profit. Red Deluxe reminds us that it's all about the audience - and if you can break through the clutter with an appropriate message for your audience - that doesn't mean you can't be irreverent, can't have fun, or can't do what you haven't done before.

See the Red Deluxe interview in its entirety on the Plaid Nation wrapup video for Memphis, or follow Red Deluxe on Twitter!

FedEx has one of the most perfect delivery records of any company in any business. More than 99%. But when you're dealing with millions of packages delivered every day, if .01% of your overall business experiences a service failure (even by five minutes), that can represent a few thousand people. That's a near perfect delivery record, yet there are still a few thousand people left unhappy.

What if a percentage of those people are on Twitter? Or have blogs? This presents an interesting challenge that only a high volume brand like FedEx might experience. Chances are that you're not tweeting "I just received my FedEx package." Or "just dropped my package at the FedEx box." But if you were one of the .01%, you might be tempted to tweet "FedEx didn't deliver my package today."

People are most passionate about brands when they do something extraordinary. Extraordinarily good or extraordinarily bad. But every day success? Probably not. When soap works well in your dishwasher, do you tweet about it? Nope. But if it fails, or does something magical, you may choose to share it with the world.

We found this to be an interesting challenge that FedEx and other high volume brands have to deal with every day. FedEx has a team of people devoted to monitoring this social chatter, and they proactively reach out to folks experiencing issues. They've also created blogs and other media to help tell more of the magical things that they're doing every day. They're clearly doing a great job at managing the .01% in addition to the 99.9% success stories. For good reason. FedEx SVP of Digital Access Marketing Mark Colombo points out that a 1% increase in loyalty can bring significant earnings straight to the bottom line.

What about your brand? Are you addressing the .01%?

Plaid was welcomed to FedEx yesterday with a red carpet.

When we added Memphis to the Plaid tour route, FedEx was an obvious choice for a stop. With 32,000 employees in Memphis, they're the supporters of a ton of commerce in the market. They're also one of the world's most iconic brands, a part of American pop culture and have a history of award winning advertising.

Matt Ceniceros from the Media Relations team saw our tweets and invited us in. Matt managed to schedule an interview with Director of Advertising Steve Pacheco, and made our day.

Most executives of Steve's stature would prefer to be stuck in a meeting, out playing golf or tending to their inbox. But not Steve. He hung with the PlaidNation tour crew for most of his morning - chatting about advertising, the industry, FedEx business, and branding. Steve shared plenty of great stories and insight, and gave us some inside scoop on future plans and ideas for the brand. We learned much from an advertising superstar.

See our interview with Steve in the Plaid Nation wrapup video for Memphis, and follow Matt and Steve on Twitter. Thanks, Matt, Steve, and the entire purple team in Memphis!

When you're in a different city every day meeting really cool people, one of the first things they usually do is point you to the most awesome local eateries.

No matter how much you think "you're going to be really good today," you find yourself in situations like "well, I'll never have BBQ like this ever again, so I might as well..." And you do.

Eventually, you begin to crave sugar, fat and meat constantly. We've pretty much accepted that we have a need to eat every two hours now, while on tour. We're naming our meals, too:

Pre-breakfast (at the hotel)
Breakfast (Could be Starbucks, could be waffles)
Snack (highly caffeinated, and something sugary)
Lunch
Linner (the new meal between lunch and dinner)
Snack (highly caffeinated, and something sugary)
Dinner (must include BBQ or many fried things)
Post dinner (a second dinner that some people call dessert)
Snack (this one's optional)

Oh yeah - and most of these meals are complimented with the best local brews. Needless to say, by the time we get to New Orleans, we'll all be wearing sweatpants.

It’s back. We still have a nice collection of FREE Subway cards we need to give away while on tour. DID WE MENTION FREE? This keeps Subway the tour sponsor happy and keeps us at Plaid happy. If you win? It will keep you happy.

So here’s the deal: Today, Wednesday, we’ll pick 20 people on Twitter at random and give them each one $5 dollar gift card.

All ya have to do: From now until midnight tonight, tweet something interesting and original using the tags: #plaidnation and #subway

Facts, fiction, whatever. BE CREATIVE. No adult content, no illegal stuff, yatta. Basically, follow Twitter’s TOS. We’ll pick the 20 and let you know by Thursday.

The other rules:
1) Your update has to have those two tags above.
2) If you were one of last week’s winners, you’re not eligible today.
3) $5 dollar card is only good in the U.S. and Canada.

Winners will then be asked to contact rj *at* plaid.com with their winning tweet, name and valid mailing address, Winning tweets will also be viewable on Plaid’s tour blog.

(Clearly the coolest Mayor in the nation is the one who let Plaid take over Denver.)

The second coolest Mayor is none other than Raeanne Presley (yes, she's related). Within a few hours of our arrival in Branson, she saw our tweets and reached out. We scheduled a meeting using Twitter and conducted an awesome interview.

We learned about how Branson is doing during the recession (just fine), how they're dealing with the brand image of old people in Branson, that hillbillies do still exist, and the difference between a jubilee and a jamboree.

See the full interview in the wrapup video for Branson on the tour dashboard, and follow Mayor Presley on Twitter.

Thanks, Mayor Presley from your friends at Plaid!

Dept Zero is pretty awesome for a variety of reasons. Sure, they have Pabst Blue Ribbon on tap in their "fun room". They do killer work for a bunch of really impressive clients. And they're bringing art to their community in a most impressive way.

They found an abandoned space in town and turned it into a venue for artists, DJ's, bands, fashion designers and other creatives without the resources to have a space of their own. They've made the space available FOR FREE for any artists in the community. In a band, and want a place to play? Want to produce a fashion show for your new line of clothes? Need a space to show your photography or fine art? Not a problem.

How'd they do it?
First, they convinced one of their clients, Scion to sponsor the space. This wasn't difficult as the space plays perfectly to the Scion brand and the audience they want to reach. Then they partnered with a local venue (conveniently next door) to get a liquor license (and bartenders.) A local sculptor adopted the cause and created furniture, a DJ booth and lighting from Scion parts, jet engine parts, and other junk yard finds.

The end result is the Scion Lab - a space that's pretty much booked solid through October, helping the arts scene thrive in Kansas City, while building buzz for Scion. Everyone wins.