The Brief

Demand for fur is increasing in China. But fur animals are treated in a cruel fashion, often being skinned alive and left to die in excruciating pain. The law doesn’t care. And the fur-wearing Chinese public has no clue. Graphic violence in awareness campaigns hasn’t worked. It only makes viewers turn away quickly. To get through to people, we needed an approach that didn’t depend on shock and awe or blood and gore.

Creative Execution

Instead of blood and gore, we used the beauty of the animals to attract the attention of the viewers. The invitation for a closer examination quickly turned into the surprises and horror that motivated the viewers to make a stand.

Describe the creative solution to the brief/objective.

We got 36 skilled sculptors to cover dozens of life-size animal models—including minks, rabbits and foxes— in over half a million needles. The show traveled around the chilly northeast provinces of China where fur demand is highest. Visitors’ emotions ranged from pleasure to surprise to horror, as they are first drawn to the animals, and then realized they were covered in needles, and finally uncovered the story of their torture. We also built an online site where people could pledge never to wear fur and share their thoughts on social platforms. For each signature, a needle changed back to a strand of fur.

Results

The ‘Fur Hurts’ website has more than 137,700 page views. We have also received more than 80,000 Weibo pledges against buying fur and the Weibo pledge was forwarded over 40,000 times in the first week which was 40 times our target. Celebrities like Sun Li have joined the cause and her anti-fur video gained more than 20,000 retweets at Weibo. The video has more than 61,523 clicks in 3 weeks, which is 4 times over the industry average. 5 mainstream TV stations, 30 digital media, covered the event and the coverage was reposted on 40 famous Chinese artists’ personal sites.