During research we found shocking statistics:

Employers in Russia don’t hire people with Down syndrome.

ONLY 4 are officially employed in a country of 146 000 000 people.

Russian society doesn’t believe people with Down syndrome can work.

As a result adults with Down syndrome have no chance to live a full life.

Also we found out there is PLENTY OF WORK at any pet hotel. Being away from their owners, dogs always need extra care and attention. And most importantly, dogs don’t notice disabilities and accept everyone the way they are.

We had an IDEA to inspire a real pet hotel to hire people with Down syndrome.

In partnership with DownsideUp charitable foundation we found 5 young people with Down syndrome willing to work and inspired a real dog hotel “Hors” to hire them for 3 months.

The experiment was filmed and the “pUp syndrome” film came into being.

We created a unique social experiment and filmed it throughout its length. This is how “pUp syndrome” film came into being. It tells an inspiring story about the gradual progress of 5 young people with Down syndrome working in dog hotel “Hors” alongside dogs. The film shows that unlike Russian employers, dogs don’t see a disability and accept the young employees just as they are.

The story flow is built on interviews of the project participants: psychologists, mothers, dog hotel staff. During the project it became clear to everyone that the dogs’ kind nature helped the guys open up and reveal their professional potential.

The film spotlights the conclusion: people with Down syndrome deserve to be employed.

It was launched on Russian YouTube on World Down Syndrome Day and supported by a widescale PR campaign.

DownsideUp Charitable foundation confirms numerous calls from potential employers who offer to hire a person with Down syndrome to work in the office/in a café/in trade.

Seeing the demand DownsideUp opened a new department of professional adaptation for people with Down syndrome.

Mars company committed to employ 4 people with Down syndrome in a new dog centre in Ulyanovsk region, which will open in 2017.

The project officially became the First Professional Adaptation Programme for people with Down syndrome in Russia.

On YouTube “pUp syndrome” film got 7 250 000 views at Average View Duration of 2,5 minutes.

The project was covered twice by national TV at prime time and other national and regional media including TV, radio and social, which brought $ 1 117 778 USD of earned media. Total views of the film reached 24 000 000. The campaign brought 201 610 504 media impressions.

In 2015 “Feed The Good” marked Pedigree’s first global campaign in years. To amplify it locally in Russia we had to start a fresh engaging conversation with the audience by inspiring them with a real life example of how dogs make the world better.

“pUp syndrome” campaign was aimed at destroying a massive social stereotype – Russians believe that people with Down syndrome can’t work. To prove them wrong we created a unique social experiment. We inspired a real dog hotel “Hors” to hire 5 young people with Down Syndrome to work for 3 months alongside dogs - who accept

The main target audience for this film was any person who liked dogs, as we aimed to win the hearts of a broad audience by inspiring them with a real life example of how dogs make the world better. The key objective was to build respect towards Pedigree® as a culturally valuable and socially responsible brand in Russia, building a brand perception which goes far beyond a simple bag of dog food. Our goal was to stand out in our local petcare category.

We launched the campaign on World Down syndrome day by placing a masthead banner and uploading the film on YouTube. The same day a PR press event was organized. Journalists and a celebrity ambassador started the initial discussion. The film was added to YouTube trueview and seeded in popular social networks. Given the content and its emotional force it was shared by bloggers and celebrities.

Situation

At the beginning of 2015 the global Pedigree ® creative platform Feed the goodTM was launched. It is built around the insight that dogs help bring out the inner good in people. In Russia we produced a TVC copy which successfully presented the platform locally.

Brief

The brief was to amplify the global creative platform Feed the goodTM and create a campaign through emphasizing the positive impact that dogs have on people.

Objectives

The key objective was to build more respect towards Pedigree® as a culturally valuable and socially responsible brand in Russia, building a brand perception that goes far beyond a simple bag of dog food.