How Vanish represented autistic experiences with heart-warming, stain-removing spot
Vanish: Me, My Autism, and I from Vanish and Zenith took Golds in the Advertising—sponsored by Kantar and the CPG/FMCG categories at The Drum Awards for Marketing EMEA 2024. Here is the award-winning case study.
Vanish is about helping clothes live longer, brighter, and stain-free. One community that relies on the longevity of their clothing is the autistic one. A favorite jumper or tee can mean the difference between feeling safe and peaceful and feeling tense and frightened. This is the story of how a media idea made an impact on teenage autism and not only won a million pounds of free media but created a huge multi-channel campaign. There was no budget for any of this, which started life as an observation about teen autistic girls and their favourite clothes.
Insight & Idea
It started with a film created in partnership with Havas and Channel 4, winning the Diversity in Advertising award and being granted £1m in free airtime across TV, VOD, and social. The film follows the life of Ash, a teenage autistic girl who cherishes her favorite hoodie. With no budget, we then pitched for more investment. We then looked to bring the film to life outside of Channel 4, and across ITV and Sky as well as social and cinema, aiming to reach families with pre-teen/teenage children. We secured shows like Gogglebox, Ant & Dec’s Saturday Takeaway, and Celebs Great British Bake-off, and spots around brand ambassador Christine McGuinness’ appearances on Lorraine and Sky News.
Across digital on Facebook and YouTube, we directed viewers to the information portal set up with our charity partner Ambitious About Autism and ran a high-impact video via Good-Loop, where user views translate directly to donations. This resulted in £25k donations for Ambitious About Autism. But we didn’t just run the ad: we brought together a community of teenage TikTok creators with autism, sharing their relationship with their favorite clothing items.
Working again with Havas and Energy, we created an installation pop-up at Oxo Gallery on Southbank called ‘Me, My Must Haves and I’. It became a bit of a museum of precious clothing items alongside descriptions from the owners themselves on why the items are so important.
Results
Vanish achieved its highest search volume in ten years. All brand metrics related to the campaign rose significantly, including ‘Vanish raises awareness of the importance of clothes care for autistic people’ (+5PP) and ‘Vanish helps clothes live longer’ (+6PP). An additional metric of ‘Opinion’ achieved an improvement of 69%. We can confidently say that this campaign improved the perception of Vanish by almost 70%.
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