| Title | ANIMAL STRIKE |
| Brand | PAW JUSTICE |
| Product / Service | CHARITY |
| Category | A06. Use of Social in a Direct Campaign |
| Entrant | DDB GROUP NEW ZEALAND Auckland, NEW ZEALAND |
| Entrant Company | DDB GROUP NEW ZEALAND Auckland, NEW ZEALAND |
| Advertising Agency | DDB GROUP NEW ZEALAND Auckland, NEW ZEALAND |
| Media Agency | OMD Auckland, NEW ZEALAND |
| Name | Company | Position |
|---|---|---|
| Andy Fackrell | DDB Group New Zealand | Executive Creative Director |
| Shane Bradnick | DDB Group New Zealand | Creative Director |
| James Conner | DDB Group New Zealand | Art Director |
| Christie Cooper | DDB Group New Zealand | Copywriter |
| Jenny Travers | DDB Group New Zealand | Account Director |
| Jason Vertongen | DDB Group New Zealand | Lead Designer |
| Sam Schrey | DDB Group New Zealand | Senior Digital Designer |
| Dov Tombs | DDB Group New Zealand | Producer |
| Paul Myles | DDB Group New Zealand | Developer |
| Cameron Crosby | DDB Group New Zealand | Lead Developer |
| Toby Morris | DDB Group New Zealand | Illustrator |
| Nikita Kearsley | DDB Group New Zealand | Creative Art Buyer |
| Julz Lane | DDB Group New Zealand | Production Manager |
| Renee Lam | DDB Group New Zealand | Designer |
| Lucinda Sherborne | DDB Group New Zealand | Head Of Planning |
| Michiel Cox | DDB Group New Zealand | Digital Planner |
| Jack Murphy | DDB Group New Zealand | Social Planner |
| Paul Pritchard | DDB Group New Zealand | Digital Director |
| Sean Brown | DDB Group New Zealand/Mango | Senior Account Director |
| Beat PR | Additional company | |
| Eleisha Balmer | DDB Group New Zealand/Mango | Senior Account Manager |
In 2013 the New Zealand government passed a law that pushed the producers of legal party drugs to safety test them on dogs. Animal-rights activists, Paw Justice, asked us to create a campaign that would encourage their facebook fans and the public to force the government to review this law. With very little money or time before we needed to get a petition into parliament we needed to do something drastic to get the public behind the campaign. So we decided to show them the value of animals by making them live without them for a day.
We all love being entertained by animals online but when it comes to watching hard-hitting animal-rights PSAs most people turn away. Instead of showing the public something they didn’t want to see, we got their attention by taking away what they love, But there is so much animal content online we couldn’t create the strike through paid media alone. So we also engaged those who create and share animal content by giving them the tools to make the strike themselves. All mediums worked together seamlessly to create the strike, gain awareness and spread our petition all at the same time.
We created an animal strike, with the aim of blocking animal content in New Zealand for one day. We collaborated with YouTube and google to block popular animal videos using unskippable, prerolls utilizing popular animal search terms. At the same time we worked with TV stations who didn’t play animal shows on the day. All this led people to a website where they could sign the petition then download a strike toolkit with html files, videos and jpegs that they could upload to their social media profiles, youtube channels and websites to block their own animal content.
We did it! We changed the law. Due to an immense amount of public pressure, Prime Minister John Key announced, “There will be no animal testing, either locally or internationally to support the application for a physco active substance”. In only a few days we received over 58,000 petition signatures. We spent less than $5000 yet received a potential reach of over 22million. 98% of all those visited the website went on to sign the petition. 78% visited the website through social media channels. Over 110,000 people & their animals took part in the strike online either by uploading a strike message or participating on our facebook page. #animalstrike trended on twitter on the day of the strike.