Casey House
Break Bread Smash Stigma

The Challenge

In the 1980s, stigma surrounding HIV verged on hysteria and today the stigma still exists but is silent: the media have stopped talking about it. Casey House, a global leader in HIV/AIDS care, needed a compelling campaign to shine light on the stigma that still exists for people living with HIV/AIDS and get media talking about it again. It needed a creative and compelling experience to engage new donors and inspire existing ones in Toronto, the home of their new facility. The launch of this facility, and its evolution from a hospice to a hospital, was the opportunity to ignite the conversation.

The Insight

In partnership with Leger Research Intelligence Group, the agency conducted a national poll revealing 50% of Canadians won’t accept food from someone with HIV so it used food to expose the stigma. Inspired by this shocking statistic, the team created June’s HIV+ Eatery: the world’s first HIV+ restaurant, run entirely by HIV+ kitchen staff and named after Casey House’s founder, June Callwood.

Over three nights, Toronto diners showed understanding and compassion, enjoying a meal prepared by 14 HIV+ people. The agency collaborated with Toronto Chef Matt Basile to train volunteers-turned-cooks and develop the menu.

The Plan

Press Conference – Held in Toronto to unveil Casey House’s new facility, and to launch June’s HIV+ Eatery. The event included a ribbon cutting ceremony with dignitaries, donors, Casey House executives, The Honourable Kathleen Wynne, His Worship, and Mayor John Tory.

Media Assets – The brand needed equally compelling assets to arm media with. To make its clients’ humanity more visible than their disease, the brand put them front and centre with provocative headlines to grab everyone’s attention. The team partnered with notable Canadian photographer Matt Barnes creating a series of portraits, featuring our star cooks, wearing custom-designed aprons that told story through cheeky yet serious headlines.

Media Invite to VIP Launch – The brand partnered with Chef Basile and a few of the HIV+ cooks to create a provocative media kit. Leveraging the hard-hitting headlines from the campaign creative, it sent media and influencers soup, made by HIV+ cooks, as a preview to the restaurant experience.

Broadcast Media Tour – In addition to our Casey House spokespeople and doctors, Chef Basile and our 14 HIV+ cooks also acted as spokespeople for press opportunities, each with their own unique story to tell. For Chef Basile specifically, the team hosted a media day with Canadian and international outlets.

June’s HIV+ Eatery: The team transformed existing restaurant – Church Aperitivo Bar - into June’s targeting local media, influencers, potential donors, and members of the LBGTQ communities. In partnership with Chef Basile, the Fidel Gastro team and Church Aperitivo Bar, the agency developed the four-course menu, trained all the cooks, designed all event collateral and completely rebranded the space with large-scale vinyls of our campaign imagery, a prominent #smashstigma design on the bar wall, coasters, menus, kitchen and serving staff aprons, and hats.

World AIDS Day – The team ramped up its media relations efforts leading up to Dec.1 to insert Casey House into conversation about World AIDS Day. Coming out of the strong international appetite for June’s HIV+ Eatery, the agency strategically expanded the scope of the brand’s targeted outreach to include U.S media.

The Results

The campaign sparked global conversations earning over 926 million media impressions with 515 stories, 150 from major news outlets worldwide. The brand secured feature, in-depth coverage including interviews with Casey House spokespeople, Chef Matt Basile, and our 14 HIV+ cooks in the Guardian, the Telegraph, NBC, BBC, Fox, CTV, Global, CBC, VICE, Huffington Post, Reuters, Canadian Press, NPR and People Magazine. Tickets for the pop-up restaurant sold out generating $20,000 in revenue plus an additional $100,000 in corporate donations.

This generated unprecedented social activity about HIV stigma. The campaign quickly gained over a million Facebook impressions and 900,000 on Twitter with 70,000 engagements. Casey House responded to ignorance online through a dedicated team of social listeners who directly educated 730,000+ Canadians. Out of 12,000+ comments, the campaign inspired 27% of the audience to become advocates for the cause by responding to negative comments.

Media coverage also caught the attention of HBO that aired a documentary that the brand created about June’s creating national audience and allowed continued conversation around stigma months after the pop-up restaurant.

50+ global awards won: PR Week Global Winner, One Show Gold Pencil, D&AD Pencil, 3 Cannes Shortlists, 3 Atomic Golds, IABC Gold Quill Award of Merit, Ace Awards Campaign of the Year, AdAge Silver Campaign of the Year, AICP Best in Show and 2 Gold Marketing Awards.