Donation Dollar is an idea designed to drive social change.

With over 25 million coins minted being released into circulation, each is designed to shift behaviour and make people rethink how they use currency.

Before Australians found the coins in their change, we needed to ensure they knew to look out for them, but also understood the legitimate impact they’d have.

PR was identified as the lead launch channel for its strengths in remaining agile around a turbulent news agenda, reaching mass audiences through credible third-party publishers, and leveraging KOL relationships and charity partners to influence understanding and drive trust.

To drive true social impact, the role of PR was to:

- Create mass awareness of the coin

- Position the coin as a credible solution that would directly benefit Australian charities

- Educate Australians about the coin and how to effectively engage with it

- Highlight coin’s relevancy to give Australians a tangible reason to engage with it

Donation Dollar is the first of its kind in the world – a coin with a unique call-to-action, designed to inspire and remind us to give, not only in times of crisis, but all year round.

Donation Dollar is an of?cial circulating coin, released by the existing banking distribution network, which can be spent like any other one-dollar coin, but when donated, helps make an on-going impact on the lives of Australians in need, and creates a generosity loop that lasts generations.

One coin minted for every single Australian, creating over 25 million individual, daily reminders to give.

If every Australian donated just one Donation Dollar each month, we’d raise an additional $300Million for charity each year, and $9Billion over the coin’s lifecycle.

Recent devastating events - like the Australian bushfire crisis, Covid-19 (and looming Australian 2020 recession) – meaning Australian charities needed help raising funds.

Local research into attitudes/behaviors tied to charitable giving uncovered a PR insight: One in five Australians believed they’d require some degree of charitable aid in the upcoming 12 months. Yet, 50% were still willing to give to charity, believing it to be “more important than ever in the current climate.”

Further escalating the problem, the digital revolution had changed the way people engaged with currency. By carrying less coins in our pockets, there’s been unintended consequences. In Australia, many of our charities rely on coin donations, as do the most disadvantaged among us. Donation Dollar provided society the chance to rethink the way they look at the coins we do have, by using them in a way that could help those who benefit from them the most.

PR sparked a national conversation by launching on International Day of Charity (5th September) with an exclusive segment on Australia’s most watched breakfast TV show, then hosted a press conference in Australia’s capital for national press, and regional attendees to participate virtually due to Covid-19 restrictions.

A bank of educational assets, including our research, imagery and audio commentary were pre-prepared to meet the needs of print, online, and broadcast mediums.

A diverse range of philanthropic celebrity advocates were harnessed, representative of all ages races and socio-economic cross-sections of Australia, appealing to their own unique audiences. They participated in editorial interviews and shared social content on their own channels to educate audiences on the coin mechanic.

Hero advocate Tim Costello, former CEO of World Vision Australia, and a supporting army of influencers led to the credible and trustworthy endorsement of 50,000+ charities, and the backing of Australian parliament.

The impact of Donation Dollar in Australia is real and ongoing; 25 million coins will circulate in and out of Australia’s change, over and over again for more than 30 years.

If every Australian donates just one Donation Dollar each month, this singular ongoing loop of generosity will raise an additional $300 million for charity each year, and $9 billion over the coin’s 30 year life cycle.

Donation Dollar was covered extensively across the Australian media landscape:

• 1,171 pieces of coverage

• Top 3 trending story on ABC Online

• Covered in ALL major Australian online news titles + ALL national TV channels

• Pickup in 6 international markets, including The Guardian, Wall Street Journal, Daily Mail, Business Insider and Fast Company

• 269+ million earned reach

• 88.9%+ Australian public reached

• $0 paid media support

• 99.9% positive sentiment

Post campaign, RAM reported 53% of Donation Dollars found in the first 2 months were donated to charity, no doubt the result of:

• Our awareness driving efforts

• The credible celebrity, charity and parliamentary endorsements we accrued

• The educational visual content created for earned media and celebrity advocates to use on their own channels

• Our research findings highlighting coin relevancy during the Covid-19 pandemic – when the public were nervous handling coins and the Australian recession meant relying on the generosity of Australians already doing it tough

Social commentators across international markets have called for Donation Dollar to be implemented the world over.

Australia is a wealthy country with a small population. There are 25 million people, but 3.24 million (13.6%) live below the poverty line of 50% of median income – including 774,000 children (17.7%).

(http://povertyandinequality.acoss.org.au/poverty/)

Australians’ have always been generous – in 2016, an estimated 14.9 million adults (80.8%) gave $12.5 billion to charities.

But there was a problem. As society embraced digital and card payments, people were carrying less cash. This had unintended consequences on vulnerable communities who rely on cash.

The Royal Australian Mint (sole supplier of Australia’s circulating coinage) had to reassess how Australia’s coins could be used in a different way, to better benefit our vulnerable communities.

That’s why they created 25 million Donation Dollars – one for every Australian. Never before had a coin been designed for compassion, not commerce. But now every Australian was encouraged to check their change, and make a difference.