As the World entered various states of lockdown through the early part of the pandemic, UAE residents – 85% of whom are expats with little family close by – followed the global trend of pet adoption to counter lockdown loneliness.

As society then reopened and new pet owners returned to the offices and outdoor lifestyles once more, pet adoption went from a solution to one problem to the catalyst for another – mass scale pet abandonment.

Researching the scale of this problem via pet shelters we noted a startling number of black & white pets abandoned and simultaneously uncovered the curious fact that Oreo was the 6th most popular black & white pet name!

Oreo found a role to play in its solution, setting about developing an activation aimed at supporting re-adoption of abandoned pets (named Oreo or otherwise), launching during the week of International Homeless Animals' Day.

Show the world how some of the best Oreos…aren’t cookies.

Oreo’s brand position is about staying playful, by filling the World with playful moments that bring people together and counteract the seriousness of life. In this instance, we undertook a transformational shift, from countering the seriousness of life with playfulness to shining a spotlight on a serious issue in life that would not exist if there was more playfulness and compassion in the World today.

Having uncovered the scale of pet abandonment in the UAE and the association of black & white pets with Oreo, we decided to pivot Oreo from its regular communications on the singular occasion of Homeless Animal’s Day to show that there are sometimes Oreo’s worth heroing that aren’t actually cookies.

To validate the scale of the challenge we discovered that while nationwide pet adoption grew by 7% through the pandemic, in the 12 months post lockdown abandonment outpaced voluntary surrenders by 2.5x. Pet abandonment vs. surrenders was the core issue.

We focused on current and prospective pet owners as most likely audience, yet the revelation that Dubai’s Crown Prince had recently adopted an abandoned stray dog from a city street in distressing circumstances turned it into a wider cultural conversation, helping our cause.

Our strategic transformation focused on the affinity and passion of Oreo’s fans. Reflecting on the myriad of ways people use Oreo’s in their baking the truth dawned on us that nothing is ever made worse with Oreo, and no version of Oreo is ever unloved.

Except that in this instance there were unloved Oreos; we needed to spotlight this cause and have Oreo deliver the solution.

Our first step was to set up partnerships with the largest pet adoptions centres in the UAE, to catalogue all pets - named Oreo or otherwise - on bringhomeoreo.com - an adoption friendly website specifically designed to help abandoned pets find new owners.

During the week of International Homeless Animals’ Day (20th August), we changed the conversation from cookies to pets. We replaced every existing pack with purposeful packaging designed to resemble pet homes, and made pets the stars of all of our communication. The campaign was supported across media & PR with search, digital content, news stories and a conversion mechanism all designed to drive traffic to the website and ultimately find abandoned pets a safe, new home.

Our packs sold out in 2 days and all proceeds were donated to our shelter partners.

Our media campaign delivered over 28m media impressions, a 25% increase in adoption enquiries at the shelters specifically featured in our campaign and 37% of the pets listed ultimately being rehoused within 1 month of the campaign.

The true measure of success lay in the impact on the overwhelmed pet shelters previously struggling under the volume of stray & abandoned pets. With this campaign not only did relieve the pressure to allow them to do their crucial work in the community more effectively, we also showed once again how life could be made sweeter if the world stayed just a little more playful.