Metallica Wants To Train Skilled Workers Through New Campaign

– Metallica
Wants You

Metallica is drawing inspiration from its own beginnings with a want ad designed to inspire and recruit a generation of skilled workers across the U.S, through its All Within My Hands foundation and with the help of Upstaging Inc. and workwear brand Carhartt.

The reimagined ad features band members from Metallica with a World War-era “We Want You” feel. Job seekers and supporters alike are directed to visit Carhartt.com to learn more about how to get involved with All Within My Hands’ Metallica Scholars, an initiative dedicated to providing skills and services to students of all ages looking to enter a traditional trade or other applied learning program. The ad, coming right before the Labor Day Weekend, pays homage to Metallica’s famous beginnings 40 years ago, when drummer Lars Ulrich ran his own classified ad seeking someone to jam with.

“To build the workforce of the future, we need to connect more people to the training and education that helps fill essential jobs,” said Janet Ries, Vice President of Marketing at Carhartt. “With our partnership, we’re sending the message that whether you’re in high school looking for a first step, or out of work looking for a new start: come join the skilled trades. What better time to recruit job seekers into these exciting, high-demand opportunities than on Labor Day?”

To demonstrate just how essential these jobs are, Carhartt and All Within My Hands recruited a few lucky job seekers to build a mock Metallica stage piece at production and transportation company Upstaging, Inc., with the workshop experience documented in a new video, “Hard Rock is Hard Work” looking at various trade jobs in live events such as welding and fabrication, lighting and electrical, construction, transportation and more.

Upstaging’s Robin Shaw tells Pollstar that Carhartt is donating all proceeds on Labor Day to the AWMH/Metallica scholars to be used to fund scholarships for people wanting to learn skills and join the skilled labor force.

Carhartt’s Labor Day campaign comes after millions of people in the live events industry were put out of work as concerts, sporting events, plays and all other events were shut down due to the pandemic. The need also applies to the country at large as the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports 943,000 new jobs in July 2021, many of which are in industries that require skilled labor.

“Carhartt and All Within My Hands are bound by our shared passion for supporting workforce education,” said Dr. Edward Frank, Executive Director at All Within My Hands Foundation. “As two organizations dedicated to providing opportunity, we hope to expand the Metallica Scholars program to include even more schools this year, and to get even more students trained for a career in the skilled trades.”