No Tankers DM
Dogwood Initiative
Issue 35 | June 2015
Agency
Rethink Canada
Creative Team
Creative Directors Ian Grais Chris Staples Art Directors Tony Woods Leia Rogers Writer Leia Rogers Designer Tony Woods Account Services Scott Lyons Shelley Ong Digital Strategist Leah Gregg
Production Team
Producers Cary Emley Sue Wilkinson
Other Credits
Printers Metropolitan Printers
Date
November 2014
Background
The Dogwood Initiative was an environmental lobby group established in British Columbia to protect their state from the reckless and thoughtless exploitation of its oil and coal deposits.
In seeking popular support for its battles against vested interests, the Dogwood Initiative believed it was helping to revive real democracy.
Idea
There had already been a significant number of oil spills on Canada's coastline from tankers loaded with crude. Some of the most powerful oil companies in the world were pushing for even more tankers to ply their trade in these waters.
The Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989, when 11 million gallons spilled into Prince William's Sound, Alaska, had shown the world that there was no safe way to transport oil.
To stimulate debate about the risks of allowing more tankers to the British Columbia coast, tanker-shaped packages filled with black, gooey oil were mailed to hundreds of homes.
In many instances, the mailing's journey caused the packages to rupture, leaking all over the letter and making the point more dramatically.
Results
The campaign made a big impact during a heated political climate. Reactions were varied but strong, ranging from supportive tweets to angry letters. The biggest impact was made online, with hundreds of DM recipients sharing pics of the DM on Twitter and Instagram. National news outlets wrote about the mail out and as the idea spread, Dogwood Initiative's No Tankers campaign saw an increase of 400% more pledges during the month of December.
Our Thoughts
Some of the other stunts Rethink have come up with for the Dogwood Initiative include putting blackened rubber ducks into the public fountains of Vancouver and setting up tourist binoculars to look out across Vancouver’s English Bay. Only these binoculars were actually an Oculus Rift headset which revealed the appalling destruction that would unfold should just one of the many tankers out in the bay have an accident.
Where DM is usually carefully targeted, the whole idea here was to mail random households. In other words, it was used in order to stir up conversation in social media. The unspoken argument was that if recipients were angry that their plastic tanker had leaked, how much angrier would they be when millions of gallons dirtied hundreds of miles of coastline?