2010 Winners & Shortlists

The Brief

Dubai is a country of expats, with most people living in rented homes and moving often. Most residents also have high incomes and plenty of options for shopping, and tend to generate a lot of junk in the process. This leads them to throw away perfectly useful things. Our client, a non-profit charity called ‘Take My Junk’ runs a service that picks up such barely used items and distributes them to less fortunate people in a neighbouring Emirate, Ajman. Our task was to promote this service in affluent areas like Jumeirah, and push people to donate.

Creative Execution

People in Dubai actually use garbage dumpsters to trash perfectly usable things in good condition. Repackaging this particular medium would grab them exactly at that point. Moreover, we placed our ‘treasure chest dumpsters’ in these affluent areas for maximum exposure, right on the roads outside their villas. This unusual ambient idea not only got a lot of attention but was actually of use as well.

Describe the creative solution to the brief/objective.

How could we grab the attention of people without spending too much on regular, traditional media? We used an unusual, never-before used outdoor ambient medium, a dumpster. We rented them from a local waste management company and used inexpensive vinyl stickers to transform them into rich, ornate ‘treasure chests’. On these dumpsters, we promoted the charity – pushing people to convert their ‘junk’ into ‘treasure’, by donating it instead of throwing it away. The use of our medium was two-fold. It could either used as space to deposit junk or call for a pick up right away.

Results

The response was overwhelmingly good. The redressed dumpster got a lot of attention with people either putting their junk in or taking the number down for a pick-up. In just two weeks, we managed to fill our client’s warehouse with donated items that will now find a place in someone else’s home. The number of hits on www.takemyjunkuae.com increased two fold and Take My Junk now also has a Facebook fan page!