2014 Winners & Shortlists

Results and Effectiveness

Our print experience helped reach 123,000 people. The campaign helped grow awareness of Astigmatism from 7% to 33% in only 5 weeks, a remarkable achievement. Moreover, people’s intention of visiting an eye optician improved from 25% to 39%. (Source: Agency Tracking Research)

Creative Execution

Imagine picking up the morning newspaper and seeing the critical sports headlines blurred. We knew Saturday was a big day for football fans so we decided to surprise them. We ‘blurred’ the front page of UAE’s top newspaper Sports 360 with a message ‘Are your Daily Scores out of Focus’. Naturally, readers were confused wondering if there was something wrong with their eyesight. When they turned the newspaper, they were able to see the real front page of the newspaper with a message about Astigmatism.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

Imagine not being able to read this sentence clearly or not seeing things that matter to you. The truth is that without clear vision, you cannot experience life fully. Astigmatism is an eye condition characterized by blurry vision. Nearly a million adults in UAE suffer from it but only 7% are actually aware of it* ! The truth is that people rarely get their eyes checked. We needed to overcome this consumer apathy. Alcon’s challenge was to raise awareness of this wide-spread but lesser known ailment and encourage people to get their eyes checked. What if instead of telling people, we could let people see what Astigmatism was like for themselves? We identified media channels where vision is critical to the enjoyment of the experience. Reading newspapers was one such occasion when seeing things really mattered