When you’re all tucking in to your Christmas dinners next week,
spare a thought for the animal you’re devouring. It is this guilt that
the Vegetarian Society is hoping to harness with an innovative ambient
media campaign now running in Leeds.
Poulters has created the campaign using live cows sporting rather
stylish string vests. We know it sounds strange but read on and all will
become clear.
The Advertising Standards Authority shouldn’t have a problem with this
one, even though it found the society’s press ads by OgilvyOne featuring
cancer scars a bit hard to stomach.
Three posters featuring the cows carry slogans such as ’Help’, ’Psst,
vegetarian cookery courses’ and a frightening list of the ingredients of
a cow, including antibiotics, worming agents and the dreaded e-coli. The
telephone number of the Vegetarian Society’s Manchester office appears
at the bottom of the posters.
We understand Poulters was faced with a struggle in getting a farmer to
agree to let his cows be used for something that, if we’re honest, aims
to put him out of business. Luckily they managed to find a kindly
vegetarian farmer (Is there such a thing? - Ed) who was willing to lend
the ad guys a friendly bovine.
Only then did they stumble across the difficulties of fitting a string
vest to a 30-stone cow