T-shirt

Background

CALM is a young, cutting edge charity that is aimed at men between the ages of 15 and 35 who are most at risk of committing suicide. The campaign wanted to raise awareness and funds by asking record companies to donate exclusive music content that could be downloaded from CALM’s website for a small fee. Mindful of the many pieces of mail received by music executives – and the many requests from charities – Tullo Marshall Warren needed a hard-hitting way of getting their attention.

Idea

‘The Ultimate Comeback Tour’ - a roll call of famous musicians, all now dead as a result of suicide. A trendy, eye-catching concert T-shirt was designed promoting the Ultimate Comeback Tour and displaying the names of the artists ‘involved’ (from Ian Curtis to Kurt Cobain). The T-shirt was mailed in a transparent, vacuum packed bag so that it could be seen straightaway.

On the back of the shirt the artists’ names were listed but, instead of the venues where they would be appearing on tour, the dates of their death were printed along with the way they had committed suicide. A leaflet accompanying the shirt carried the headline, ‘We Can’t Raise the Dead’, followed inside by, ‘But We Can Raise Awareness’.

Results

110 donations have been received so far.

Our Thoughts

It doesn’t matter who your audience is, you have to talk to them in language they understand. So if you’re going to talk to record company executives, talk to them in T-shirt. This take on the classic concert-tour T-shirt featuring only dead musicians is entirely relevant to the people it was mailed to.