Stand Tall

When Greenpeace, Sierra Club, Forest Ethics and the Rainforest Action Network combined forces to save the Great Bear Rainforest, Cowie and Fox was their go to agency for all of their creative and branding needs.

Challenge

The Great Bear Rainforest is one of the last and most bio-diverse old growth rain forests left on the planet. So when it was time to put pressure on the government to make sure that it was protected, Greenpeace, Forest Ethics, Rainforest Action Network and the Sierra Club combined efforts to ensure that change was made. Cowie and Fox was challenged with the task of creating a campaign that would speak to the world with a clean and empowering message that would ensure that the government would listen.

Solution/Approach

We needed people to not only take action to support legislation that would protect the Great Bear Rainforest, but we also wanted to empower people so that they felt proud of doing so. Cowie and Fox developed the "Stand Tall" tag line which not only empowered people to be proud and to take action, it also represented and spoke of the old growth forest itself. The idea was to take the traditional "Tree Hugger" creative that one normally associates with such campaigns and to present it in a light that is fresh, clean and empowering to everyone. Once we developed a look and feel for the creative we carried it across all touch points, including viral videos, direct mail, shirt graphics, electronic direct mail, flyers, magazine, street teams and interactive website.

Result/Impact

Thousands of people took action by signing online and written petitions. The result of our combined efforts was that the BC Government signed a bill ensuring that ten million acres of the Great Bear Rainforest is protected from logging.