Bonds, McDonalds, ANZ & More Come Together For “Unignorable Ad Break” Via Special, Glue Society & PHD

During last night’s Sunday Project, 10 of the country’s biggest brands came together in support of disability representation with the “Unignorable Adbreak”. Swapping out key scenes in their spots to include a person with disability to launch the Shift 20 Initiative.

The altered spots from ANZ, AAMI, Bonds, Kia, McDonald’s, Oral-B, nib, Pantene, Uber, and Weet-Bix ran in the lead-up to Sunday and culminated in a complete media roadblock during the prime time Sunday Project.

It was designed to make viewers take notice of the lack of disability representation in advertising and launch the Shift 20 Initiative to combat it. Tourism Australia, Virgin Australia and TikTok have also come on board as foundation partners.

The Shift 20 Initiative is led by the Dylan Alcott Foundation. Australians with disabilities make up almost 20 per cent of the population. Yet in advertising, they are only represented one per cent of the time.

Ryan Fitzgerald, executive creative director at Special, said “When we first started talking to Dylan about the issue, we knew this couldn’t simply be an awareness job. We needed to do something bold that made a statement, and more importantly, created real change with a long-lasting impact.

“Changing out something that has already been and including a person with disability is a simple yet powerful way to highlight that people with disability can easily fill the same roles as anyone else.”

“Whether it’s changing the iconic face of a brand, brand representatives or simply the characters in the stories we tell, our industry is in a powerful position to send a message to 20% of Australia that, up until now, has gone largely unseen to say ‘we see you’.

“Outside of the ‘Unignorable Adbreak’ the Shift 20 Initiative is a crucial part of ensuring long-lasting change in this space. The organisation is designed to set the standard for what disability representation looks like and give others the tools and resources to make an impact.”

The majority of the production re-shoots were led by Revolver, featuring both talent and crew with disabilities. There was also essential oversight from a variety of disability consultants and production partners such as Bus Stop Films to ensure the production environment was inclusive. This included consultancy on the casting process, production considerations for people with disabilities, disability riders, crew attachments and Auslan translators.

The Glue Society was a key creative partner in the early development of this campaign. Working closely with Special from the initial agency brief, the team formed a clever and restrained production approach that would allow brands incorporating talent with disabilities to have maximum effect, ensuring the work prompted focus and discussion on the issue.

Rumble Studios, working across a number of the revised TVCs, as well as the supplementary behind-the-scenes films, brought to life with their thoughtful music, composed by Guy Brown.

Lindsey Evans, partner at Special and board director at Advertising Council Australia, said “The support from the industry has been instrumental to launching this initiative. This is about sharing and educating the wider industry as to the massive commercial and cultural opportunity of having representation of the whole population. We hope more brands see this and want to get involved. We have learnt so much from Dylan, the talent and production partners. We can all do better together – as an industry, as consumers and as brands.”

PHD worked with all of the participating brand’s media agencies to coordinate the roadblock in the Sunday Project as well as securing further paid and earned media support for the initiative from media owners across Australia.

Simon Lawson, managing director at PHD Melbourne, said “The widespread support from the media owners across Australia has been incredible, quite simply, we’ve never seen collaboration at this scale, leading to a world-first media approach. It underscores the importance of this issue. It’s been a privilege to be involved in this initiative on behalf of PHD and OMG.”

The coalition of launch partners will lead the way in commitment to fair representation of people with disabilities within their ads and marketing communications, providing opportunities and opening doors for people with disabilities. Each brand has its own unique way of showing up in the space from product development, influencer strategies, accessibility innovations, community support and employment with further innovations to come off the back of the initiative.

Dylan Alcott AO, Founder of the Dylan Alcott Foundation commented; “One of the coolest things about working with the amazing brands who have joined the initiative is seeing them learn and grow from listening to the lived experience of people with disability. From previous conversations we’ve had with brands, we know that whilst they want to include people with disabilities in their ads, they are sometimes scared they’ll get it wrong – so they don’t. Getting it wrong is okay. It starts conversations, so you can get it right and can be more inclusive and accessible for everyone – including people with disabilities. The tides are turning and the time for brands to get involved is now.”

A dedicated website has been built to give brands access to best practice resources to create more accessible and inclusive communications. Brands can sign up and find out more about the Shift 20 Initiative at shift20.org and be part of the change.

The campaign is rolling out across TV, OOH, cinema, earned media, social and digital and has even driven product innovation ensuring that all assets created have been built to be truly accessible.

CREDITS:

CLIENT 

Client: Dylan Alcott Foundation

Founder: Dylan Alcott OAM

General Manager: Georgie Saggers

Board Chair: Martin Alcott

FOUNDATION PARTNERS 

AAMI

ANZ

Bonds

Kia

McDonald’s

nib

Oral-B

Pantene

Uber

Weet-Bix

TikTok

Tourism Australia

Virgin Australia

CREATIVE + PR AGENCY

Agency: Special Australia

Partner/CEO: Lindsey Evans

Partners/CCO: Julian Schreiber & Tom Martin

Partner/CSO: Bec Stambanis

Executive Creative Director: Ryan Fitzgerald

Creative Director/Creative: Adam Ferrie

Creative Director/Creative: Peter Cvetkovski

Copywriter: Shaun McFarlane

Art Director: Bella Plush

Managing Director, Melbourne: Sarah Raine

Managing Director, Special PR: Alex Bryant

Senior Business Director: Felicity Touzeau

Business Director: Priya Addams Williams

Business Director: Nick Darrigan

Creative Strategist: Kate Wilkinson

Head of Film & Content Production (Syd): Sevda Cemo

Head of Film & Content Production (Melb): Sophie Simmons

Lead Producer: Charlotte Wren

Head of Stills Production: Nick Lilley

Director, Digital: James Simmons

Digital Producer: Gigi Song

Head Of Design: Adam Shear

Designer: Sarah Ristevski

Designer: Maggie Webster

Finished Art: John Rivera

Comms Strategy Director: Georgia Thomas

FILM PRODUCTION

Production Company: Revolver

Directing Collective: The Glue Society

Director: Alice Cogin

Managing Director/Co-Owner: Michael Ritchie

Executive Producer/ Partner: Pip Smart

Executive Producer: Jasmin Helliar

Producer: Max Horn

Cinematographer: Dale Bremner

BTS CAST

Rae Pastuszak – nib

Nathan Borg – Bonds

Sara Shams – ANZ

Mia Adams – McDonald’s

Basketball NSW – Kia

Eva Kalpidis – Weet-Bix

Adam Bowes – Uber

Lara Nakhle – AAMI

BTS FILM PRODUCTION

Production Company: Revolver

Directing Collective: The Glue Society

Directors: Alice Cogin, Pete Baker & Jonathan Kneebone

DOP: Will Robertson & Matt Maule

Post Production: The Glue Society Studios

Editor: Luke Crethar

Colourist: Scott Stirling

DISABILITY x PRODUCTION CONSULTANTS + CREW ATTACHMENTS

Consultancy: Bus Stop Films

CEO: Tracey Corbin-Matchett OAM

COO: Dianna La Grassa

General Manager Bus Stop Employment: Sarah-Jane Johnson

CREW ATTACHMENTS

Director’s Assistant: Nathan Tsui

Lighting: Jack Small

BTS Attachment: Juddy Dodd

Directors Attachment: Conor Brannerly

HMU Attachment: Emily Skerri-Rickert

AUSLAN CONSULTANTS & INTERPRETERS

Deaf Consultant: Sue Jo Wright

Auslan Support Services: Sign Hear

Interpreter: Will Tapp

Interpreter: Samantha Rutherford

Interpreter: Joshua Ophel

STILLS PRODUCTION

Photographer: Josh Robenstone

Producer: The ARTL-NE / Amy Henderson

Digital Assistant: Alexander Cooke

Retouching: Visual Thing

TVC POST PRODUCTION

Post House: HECKLER

Editor: Andrew Holmes

Post Producer: Coralie Tapper

Colourist: Matt Fezz

Flame Operator: Julian Ford

Compositor: Drew Downes and Nitin Amin

TVC & BTS SOUND

Sound House: RUMBLE STUDIOS

Executive Producer: Michael Gie

Producer: Siena Mascheretti

Sound Engineers: Tone Aston & Cam Milne

BTS MUSIC

Composer: Guy Brown

Brand BTS

Post House: MANIMAL

CASTING

Casting Director: Natalie Jane Harvie, Citizen Jane Casting (Bonds, ANZ, Uber)

MEDIA AGENCIES

PHD Australia

Managing Director: Simon Lawson

Business Director: Joey Graham

Account Executive: Ben Williams

SEO: James Hanley

Programmatic: Jethro Pacquing & Riana Adams

Omnicom Media Group

Chief Executive Officer: Peter Horgan

Research & Insights

TRA