Due to intensive hunting activities the number of gray wolves has decreased; their habitat has shrunk and disintegrated by 40%; and they have become endangered species on the brink of extinction in Hungary. However the gray wolf plays a crucial part in its natural habitat, without his presence there are no healthy ecosystems.

WWF Hungary wanted to raise awareness on this problem, and demonstrate the need for protecting the unstable population of gray wolves.

The character of the gray wolf has always played an important role in the culture of Hungarian people. We Hungarians love stories about this strange, powerful and mystical animal. These “wolf-stories” accompany us, and we can’t imagine our lives without them. We demonstrated that without this unique animal we lose a crucial narrative: the power of storytelling. With a QR-code we offered direct link to a “donation subpage”, where people could help “save” the original narrative by giving donations.

We demonstrated that this “wolf-narrative” is always with us by putting posters on busy places, where lots of people can encounter our message: posters on the side of escalators for a campaign period of 2 weeks.

The “Gray Wolf Donation” is only a minor agenda in the activity of WWF Hungary. However the campaign helped to increase by 20% comparing to the donations of the previous year. It’s the first campaign that wasn’t supported by any celebrities; still it could achieve 300% more total media reach than any previous creative campaigns by WWF Hungary. For the first time the leading creative magazine in Hungary covered the campaign acknowledging the creative concept. The campaign raised awareness on the gray wolf as an environmental component with 15% among WWF Hungary target group. A survey made by WWF Hungary interns after the campaign period showed that 60% of target group members associated wolves as environmental components with our “Gray Wolf Donation” campaign.