SAN FRANCISCO — San Francisco’s top business leaders have come together to launch a new campaign that highlights the many reasons why the city has been – and will always be – one of the world’s greatest.

With the goal of inspiring a more equitable and resilient economy, the non-profit organization Advance SF worked with Goodby Silverstein & Partners (GS&P) to created ‘It All Starts Here,’ a multi-media campaign that positions San Francisco as a hub for business and the arts.

Launched on Nov. 3 at Oracle Park, home of the San Francisco Giants, the campaign brings together dozens of the city’s leading employers and businesses, including Gap Inc., Levi’s, Lyft, OpenAI, San Francisco Giants and Uber, all of which are committed to solving the city’s post-pandemic challenges. 

“San Francisco has survived great fires, earthquakes and deep recessions, and it keeps coming back – stronger,” said Larry Baer, president and CEO of the San Francisco Giants and co-chair of the Advance SF board. “There is no doubt, we have real challenges to overcome, and we know the business community, along with the local community and government, must drive the solutions. With this campaign, we’re creating a spark so that people say, ‘Let’s do this together, because San Francisco is an amazing city and ‘it all starts here.’” 

The campaign highlights San Francisco’s diverse, homegrown companies, institutions, and IP. Between 2020 and 2022, 18 of the 27 venture-backed companies that had an IPO, SPAC, or direct listing valued over $10 billion were headquartered in the Bay Area. One ad features Mike and Sulley from Pixar’s Monsters University entering their dorm room with the corresponding headline “UCSF. Berkeley. Stanford. Monsters University.” Another ad combines the little-known fact that the waterbed was invented in San Francisco in 1968 with the well-known fact that the summer of 1967 was probably what inspired the invention. 

A two-minute video voiced by actor and director Peter Coyote, a long-time Bay Area resident, anchors the campaign, transporting viewers from the city’s earliest days of entrepreneurialism and pioneering spirit to its cutting-edge present. Coyote guides viewers some of the area’s most notable moments of innovation and influence, from Levi’s to electric streetcars and Lucasfilm to Google. 

“San Francisco is a place of possibility and promise and a beacon for forward thinkers, change makers, icons and iconoclasts,” said Rich Silverstein, co-founder and co-chairman of GS&P. “From Levi’s to Jerry Garcia to OpenAI, many of the world’s greatest companies, innovators, artists and musicians all come to San Francisco seeking a culture where fearlessness and innovation collide. This is a pro-business effort to remind dreamers and entrepreneurs that if you have an idea and you want to start something that’s never been done, come to San Francisco.” 

The campaign was launched ahead of the 2023 Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Leaders’ Meeting, which will be hosted in San Francisco from Nov. 11-17 and chaired by U.S. President Biden. 

For more information on the campaign visit www.itallstartshere.org.