"NEVER WALK ALONE"

Title"NEVER WALK ALONE"
BrandDANCHURCHAID (DCA)
Product / ServiceDCA MINE ACTION
CategoryG04. Sound Design
EntrantGREY GROUP Singapore, SINGAPORE
Idea Creation GREY GROUP Singapore, SINGAPORE
Media MEDIACOM Hamburg, GERMANY
Production GREAT GUNS London, UNITED KINGDOM
Production 2 CUTTERS Tokyo, JAPAN
Production 3 YESSIAN MUSIC Detroit, USA
Contributing DANCHURCHAID DCA Copenhagen, DENMARK

Credits

Name Company Position
Konstantin Popovic Grey Group Singapore Global Business Director & Executive VP
Till Hohmann Grey Group Singapore Executive Creative Director and VP
Antonio Bonifacio/Luis Fabra/James Dickinson/Rasiyqah Rahman Grey Group Singapore Conceptual Lead and Creative Team
Brendan Cravitz, Lauren Reilly Grey Group Singapore Agency Producers
Brian Yessian Yessian Music CCO
Richard MacCormac DanChurchAid (DCA) Head of Mine Action/Safer Communities
Nikolaj Sondergaard/ Christian Sophus Ehlers/ Anne Kristine Erhardsen/ Camilla Tollstorff Ardilso/ Mulle Juul Korsholm/ Anne Mousten/ Tobias Juhler Maureschat DanishChurchAid (DCA) Client Team
Suresh Ramaswamy/ Karishma Menon/ JunJek Low Grey Group Singapore Digital and Social Media Lead Team
James Teh Great Guns Director
Mathew Alden/ Ann Suthida Sihasavetra/ Sinthop Sophon (Jeab)/ Nattachai Kitjanawanchai (Nut Art) Great Guns Film Production Team
Michael Dragovic/ Jeff Dittenber/ Richard Rodgers/ Oscar Hammerstein II Yessian Music Sound Team
Timo Otsuki/ Shumpei Negami Cutters Film Production Team
Ryan McGuire/ Ben Conkey/ Toshiki Kamei/ Dr. Yu/ Tomomi Ogawa Cutters Editing and Post Production Team
Huma Qureshi, Yanrong Pang Grey Group Singapore PR Team

The Campaign

Let's connect the topic of clearing mines/UXO with the world of football. Urging fans to help #ClearThePitch. Because: 1. Football is arguably the world's biggest sport. It's a huge industry, a huge popular culture topic and also a hugely loved hobby. 2. There is a quite shocking connection: in countries affected, it's extremely dangerous for kids to just go outside and play some ball. 3. One of the most evil remnants of wars are cluster bomblets that actually look like balls - making them difficult to spot and easy to mistake for kids. Core creative piece: Let's make a film that comes across like a highly stylized big football brand ad - hijacking the iconography and music of football -, that takes a disturbing turn with an actual mine victim pointing out just how difficult it is to spot cluster-munitions/mines.

Creative Execution

The main film uses an iconic song of the football/soccer world with a very strong emotional connection to the fans. We hijacked and tweaked it for the purpose, feeling ambiguous at the start: could be an anthem or something serious... We considered a 12 man choir, a single adult or child, or to move the lyric through a group of people that slowly join to sing together. In the end, we landed on a distinctive voice building in layers with natural emotion and passion. Subtle sound design helps to misdirect with the fans chanting and cheering. This sets up the story. The sonic palette feels passionate for the sport and positive until the moment we see the boy: the music drops to acknowledge this horrible outcome for an innocent victim. It picks back up to glorify the call-to-action. Indeed: if we are all in "you'll never walk alone"

Indication of how successful the outcome was in the market

This film went live on April 4th, the International Day of Mine Awareness. It received instant global coverage, media and audience attention. In the DCA-home-market Denmark the Foreign Minister as well as 6 major-league football teams instantly pledged full support, while many media outlets ran interviews, including live coverage in then national morning-show. Further afield it continued. The film received ovations from countless media outlets and was placed on their channels for free. Coverage about the surprising angle of the DCA-campaign took place in such distant places as Brazil, Mexico, Southeast Asia. Almost all other NGO active in the field of mine-clearing/cluster-munitions pledged support and amplified the campaign. In one week this lead to over 8.000 unique articles and mentions, more than 500k active shares via FB and Twitter, free media coverage worth millions and DCA dominating the topic of mine clearance with a new angle reaching new audiences.

Of course: DCA doesn't just clear football pitches - DCA creates safer communities for families and looks after all mine victims. But: with #ClearThePitch DCA can reach a global mass audience by tapping into a topic they care about more: their love of a sport. This meant: the DCA message and mission needed to be enveloped into a story using iconography and elements that are relevant to a football fan. Not the typical infographics about the issue or documentary content about the actual projects. We needed a disrupting, easy to share, highly surprising and meaningful trigger. A trigger that would get global media and press to cover DCA, engage opinion leaders and also thrill the average fan. A powerful video was identified as the core tool - not as the only element of what will be a long running campaign, but as the kick-starter to generate awareness.