Together with CALM we commissioned research that revealed that 84% of men in the UK “bottle up” their emotions. It was precisely these impulses that CALM wanted to challenge; the unspoken rules that stop men asking for help.

Indeed, this idea of “bottling up” emotions inspired our central idea – playing on Chris Hughes’ celebrity status and also subverting the often-shallow world of celebrity culture.

The campaign would launch three days before World Mental Health Day, when Chris would post a sequence of teaser images on his Instagram reaching 1.9m followers, announcing simply: ‘Launches 10.10.17’.

The day before, we launched a campaign for new bottled water: L’Eau de Chris “infused with a genuine Chris Hughes tear” available exclusively from major fashion retailer TOPMAN to drive a spike in mainstream media attention.

And on the 10th, the reveal: it’s actually ‘lu-di-crous’ that suicide remains the biggest killer of young men. #DontBottleItUp.

On Monday 9 October, L’Eau de Chris, a bottled water “infused with a genuine Chris Hughes tear”, was launched with spoof visuals showing Chris posing in TOPMAN boxer shorts holding a bottle of his new water brand, with a tear running down his cheek.

Media coverage in top-tier national titles including The Sun, Shortlist and Evening

Standard was incredulous: celebrity absurdity had surely reached new levels. But they

were in on the act.

The following day, national media were invited to a L’Eau de Chris launch event, streamed live on Facebook. Here Chris revealed his own struggles with depression and announced that it was not L’Eau de Chris, but Lu-Di-Crous.

Ludicrous that suicide remained the biggest killer of young men in the UK, because men “bottle up” their emotions. In an emotional talk, Chris urged his audience to join the conversation using the #DontBottleItUp hashtag.

L’Eau de Chris rewrote the rules about how mental health charities behave in order to engage with young men in the UK. Thanks to Chris Hughes, CALM’s message about male suicide led the news agenda and social media conversation on World Mental Health Day. It also broke all records for visits to the CALM website, where men can seek help.

The disruptive tease and reveal campaign exceeded all expectations, taking young male mental health into national news, supplements and celebrity lifestyle titles – new territory for discussion about male suicide.

From 9th October the campaign delivered the unprecedented mainstream media coverage that we knew would engage with our target audience of young men:

• 89 national and lifestyle articles

• 14 national broadcast news features

• 120m social impressions in the first 48 hours

• 5m organic video views

• 1.3m Facebook impressions

• 35,000 mentions on Twitter – 58% follower increase on CALM’s Instagram feed – 94% positive sentiment

Most importantly, it drove an unprecedented 1,800% increase in 18- to 24-year-olds visiting the CALM website, with 95% first-time visitors – powerful figures given that CALM believes that if men feel able to seek help, hundreds of suicides could be prevented, and hundreds of families and friends spared the unimaginable sadness of losing a loved-one in this way.

This incredible campaign proved the power of PR to deliver the most vital outcome we could have wished for: vulnerable young men in crisis opening up to a fresh shot at life.