The Monkeys Aotearoa team up with KidsCan to help hungry kids

As the cost-of-living soars, the effects of another crisis are being felt in classrooms across Aotearoa – the cost-of-learning.

To coincide with the start of the school year, KidsCan is launching its 2023 Back to School campaign, via The Monkeys Aotearoa, with the aim of bringing on board 450 new monthly donors to help feed and clothe school children in need.

Using verbatim comments from children about how hunger makes them feel in the classroom, the campaign uses visual and audio techniques to highlight how hunger can effect a child’s ability to concentrate and learn.

The Monkeys Aotearoa Chief Creative Officer Damon Stapleton says the campaign became clear when the phrase ‘cost-of-learning’ rather than ‘cost-of-living’ was used.

“A lot of this was about how you make this tangible for people. I always use the adage ‘you can tell people a joke or you can tell them you’re funny’ and there is a big gulf between the two. We had to make people understand on a physical, emotional platform what it feels like when you are hungry.”

To achieve breakthrough for audiences who might be experiencing burn out from similar types of appeals, Stapleton says it was important for this campaign to avoid some of the commonly used tropes.

“We are trying to make people think about if they were in their shoes, you know what this feels like. That is what the campaign is about – getting people to feel what it’s like to be hungry and the consequences of that.

“When you are trying to raise money, more so than when you are doing a brand campaign, breakthrough is even important because you have a small amount of time that you are trying to do something in.”

KidsCan CEO and Founder Julie Chapman says that while the Back to School campaigns are nothing new for KidsCan the cost-of-living crisis means the need for KidsCan is greater than ever.

“We help feed 50,000 school children every day, and sadly demand is only growing, with thousands more on our waitlist for support.”  

The Monkeys Aotearoa, part of Accenture Song, has been active since May 2021 and Stapleton says they are just getting started.

“We are starting to go to spaces and places that I don’t think anyone else is going. In a year or two it will make a lot more sense to other people. We are keeping our head down and doing a lot of work and at the end of the day the work speaks for itself.”

The Back to School national awareness campaign runs for three weeks across broadcast television, out of home advertising, print, radio, social and digital executions.  

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