The "Animal is Not a Gift" campaign by the premium pet food brand Club 4 Paws won silver at the ADC*UA Awards

"The foundation of the 'Animal is Not a Gift' campaign is the Look 4 Paws responsible adoption project, which the Club 4 Paws brand launched in May 2022," said Yuriy Kovalyuk, Senior Brand Executive at Mussmarket Brands at Kormotech. The project works with shelters to help place animals and increases the number of responsible owners by spreading useful information. Thanks to the Look 4 Paws adoption platform, over 1,100 animals have already found new families."

At the end of 2023, before the Christmas holidays, Club 4 Paws launched a campaign to remind people that animals are not holiday gifts.

It is essential to note that more than 600 million animals worldwide are homeless, and the number is constantly growing. According to Save Pets of Ukraine, the number of animals in Ukrainian shelters will increase by 20% to 100% in 2022, especially in frontline regions. About 80% of abandoned animals were once pets whose owners gave them up for various reasons.

This alarming increase in homeless animals prompted Club 4 Paws to launch the "Animal is Not a Gift" communication campaign, encouraging people to make more responsible decisions about adopting pets.
Shelters and social initiatives promote pet adoption. However, they often face the issue of people returning animals. Even purebred cats and dogs bought from breeders can end up in shelters or on the streets if their owners need to understand the full responsibility of having a pet. 

This problem intensifies during the Christmas and New Year holidays, as people often bring animals home as gifts for children or friends.

"When creating advertising or informational campaigns, we ask ourselves: 'Does this work bring us closer to a better future?' Creating campaigns that make people think about positive changes, responsibility, and duties is important. We wanted to show that equating a living being to a gift item is unethical and wrong. Only some people who receive a pet as a gift are ready for the responsibility. As a result, this becomes one of the causes of the global problem of homeless animals," explained Serhiy Pronkin, head of the project team at ISD Group.

According to Yuriy Kovalyuk, Club 4 Paws used interactive formats such as animated TV, YouTube, social media, media publications, and radio to emphasize the need for a conscious approach to gifting a family to a pet.

Additionally, boxes with the message "Open me!" and a QR code inside were placed in shopping centers in Kyiv and Lviv, including "Gulliver" and "Victoria Gardens," as well as at the themed Kurazh Bazar. Anyone who opened the box could use the QR code to go to a particular landing page and learn more about the campaign.

The "Animal is Not a Gift" communication campaign resonated and made people think about the ethical side of "fluffy" gifts. Club 4 Paws plans to communicate this project annually to spread information and create a more humane and responsible attitude towards animals as companions, not property or accessories.