Still unknown among the general public, epilepsy is a neurological disease that affects more than 600,000 patients in France and 3 million people including caregivers, yet there is little public awareness of the condition within the general public. Furthermore, people are afraid by the manifestations of this disease (29% of Europeans believe that epilepsy is contagious and 72% of them don’t want to be confronted with an epileptic in their lives).

Epileptic seizures most often take the form of unpredictable absences and bouts of unconsciousness that lead to falls. Depending on where they happen, these falls may have minor or serious consequences. So for epileptic patients, even under treatment is under control, the fear of seizure is constant.

The French Federation for Research into Epilepsy (FFRE) wanted to highlight the terrible daily experiences of people with epilepsy, change people's perception of people with epilepsy, and launch an appeal for donations.

To inform people about a disease that repulses them, we decided to make epilepsy attractive by opening a shop in Paris selling second-hand items “at knockout prices”, for 3 days.

Once inside the shop, the potential buyers were surprised to discover that the objects had all been damaged by their previous owners during an epileptic seizure. The salesperson was then able to raise the “customers” awareness about epilepsy, and explain that due to indifference or stigma about epilepsy, and a lack of funding and donations, they had to use a shocking ploy to break the indifference towards the disease.

The campaign was designed to challenge the public and the media and make the disease a healthcare priority. Filmed using a hidden camera, the customers became the stars of an original video that became the Foundation’s new online campaign: “Cash Epilepsie. Broken lives at cut down prices".

Everyone who has ever witnessed an epileptic seizure has been terrified of the impressive manifestations of the disease (“72% of Europeans don’t want to be confronted with an epileptic in their daily lives.” – NY TIMES).

So how to raise people's awareness about a disease that they don't understand and that repulses them? By making this disease attractive.

This is why we created the CASH EPILEPSY shop.

To illustrate the everyday reality of this little-known disease, the FFRE opened a fake shop in Paris for three days, starting on 30 January, which pretended to be selling second-hand “cut price” objects. The curious shoppers were drawn into the store, surprised to discover that the objects had all been broken or damaged by their previous owners during an epileptic seizure.

The salesperson was then able to raise the potential buyers' awareness about epilepsy, and explain that due to indifference or stigma about epilepsy, and a lack of funding and donations, they had to use a shocking ploy so that a store like that.

To expand the reach, we also tricked people online with 5 Million fake ads. The descriptions revealed the tragic stories behind each object and proposed to make a donation.

The online film got 1 million views in less than 48h, releasing the word of thousands of epileptics. It generated 450 million social interactions.

Millions of people joined the conversation generating 1 billion media impressions.

Donations increased 1500%, making this little-known disease the most supported cause during the campaign.