What's the great idea? A road-trip documentary series to gather industry stories, connect with members, and improve advocacy efforts

Who's doing it? National Retail Federation

What's involved? Over the past two years, teams from NRF have traveled to 22 states and met with hundreds of retailers on a "Retail Across America" tour, searching for the best stories to showcase what it's like to work in the industry. The documentary series tells career, community, and innovation stories from large and small retailers as part of the association's "This Is Retail" campaign.

"It's imperative to our grassroots efforts that we hear not only their stories of careers and how they're impacting the community but also hear about what they'd like to see change," says Margaret Little, senior director of communications and brand strategy.

As the teams travel the country, NRF reconnects with members and recruits new ones, while learning what policy changes they want NRF to advocate for. The teams hear about the ways retailers are building up their communities and the roles they play in innovating and developing the customer experience. The road trip will visit seven more states in 2016.

What are people saying? "Our members love it; our retailers that we work with absolutely love it," Little says. "Our retailers are just very appreciative of the time and the resources that we've taken to go out and make sure that those stories are being told."

[This article was originally published in the Associations Now print edition, titled "Hit The Road."]