taste the future. go vegan.
connecting what we eat with our planet’s health
timeline
2017 – ongoing
location
worldwide
client
The Vegan Society
introduction
We have worked with he Vegan Society since 2017 – the oldest and original vegan organisation. They defined the word ‘vegan’ and promote vegan lifestyles for the benefit of animals, people and the environment. Their mission is to make veganism mainstream. Our development of the Plate Up for the Planet campaign has driven measurable engagement with their ambition.
We tapped into a growing awareness of the issues of climate change, animal agriculture and CO2 emissions, plus the rapidly developing movement towards a vegan lifestyle, to achieve a campaign that promotes real lifestyle, and therefore environmental, positive change.
the challenge
Reach environmentally-aware non-vegans, communicate hard truths in an engaging yet deliberately provocative manner to initiate engagement, and overcome a perceived and daunting level of inconvenience which affects cooking, eating out and buying everyday products with a vegan lifestyle.
Develop a print and digital campaign to initiate behavioural change and generate 10,000 sign-ups to the seven day vegan challenge during August and September of 2017, with the ultimate goal of converting people to a vegan lifestyle and reducing CO2 emissions.
our solution
The name, tone of voice and messaging were designed to challenge people to change the way they think about their diet. The campaign links the fact that although people care about the environment, they still eat meat and dairy. Real situations, supporting materials, high-profile endorsements and clear results demonstrate positively how every sign-up and pledge to take the seven day challenge affects our environment, encouraging non-vegans to take that extra step and try a vegan diet.
Our research identified a barrier in general understanding of CO2 emissions data. This provided the opportunity to develop an equivalency calculator to provide clarity and scale to the figures. It also gave us the tool to capture the effectiveness of our campaign in influencing social change. We defined comparison data to present with each sign-up to ensure that at least one of the calculations would resonate with each participant.
results
Campaign target of 10,000 sign-ups achieved two weeks ahead of forecast equating to:
147,000 kg CO2e saved
19,510,909 hours of low energy light bulbs saved
1,019,064 kms travelled in a car saved
767,143 kms travelled on a long haul flight saved
539,000 washing machine cycles saved
The sign-ups were a direct response to our campaign message on both print and online advertising.
The success of the 2017 campaign was reflected in ongoing activities in 2018 and 2019 with extended activities to reach a younger segment of the target audience, schools, hospitals and workplace roadshows to reach the professional environmentally aware non-vegans, and the audience engagement with sign-ups continues to grow.
“bwa have worked in close partnership with us on this integrated campaign, developing engaging and innovative ways to provoke action and raise awareness. They were quick to understand how to reach our target audience, in visual identity, style, tone of voice and communication channels with printed and interactive materials. The campaign has been a huge success so far, and we continue to work with bwa to develop new ways to encourage people to sign up to the challenge.”
Louise Davies, Head of Campaigns, Policy & Research, The Vegan Society
A distinctive, memorable and unique campaign visual language is developed for print and online materials each year, as the strategy evolves.
The illustrative style is carried through to an interactive website, you can see the most recent site here
Real-life comparison data of CO2e savings is generated with each sign up, ensuring that at least one of the calculations would resonate with each participant.
The vibrancy of the identity, the direct tone of the campaign name and the messaging resonates with a green-leaning, young, city based professional target audience.
Over the years the campaigns illustrative style has evolved and in 2021 we designed a series of animations to promote the benefits of a vegan diet.
Communications carry a hard truth and a positive message connecting diet and the environment, with a clear call to action to sign-up to the seven day vegan challenge.
A suite of interchangeable social media graphics, updated according to the number of sign-ups generated with each placement.
