MONTREAL – Astral Media today announced a million-dollar commitment in air-time and advertising space to promote its philanthropic partner, Dr Clown with a new ad campaign created by Bos.
Announced during the Infopresse Créa Awards gala on Friday, March 24, the ad campaign is the winning submission by Bos to the Créa contest, which was sponsored by Astral Media. This new commitment follows Astral’s first year of partnership, where, among other things, Dr Clown benefited from $1.5 million in donated air-time on Astral Media’s various advertising platforms (TV, radio and outdoor).
Dr Clown is a non-profit organization that brightens the lives of hospitalized patients through a professional therapeutic clown program that brings professionally trained artists and patients together in an atmosphere of imagination and fun. For children and families in hospital situations, Dr Clown alleviates the fear of the unknown, they brighten the environment and bring a very human approach to the notion of caring.
This is the first year that the Créa Awards were conferred, and Astral Media chose to leverage its sponsorship of Créa by launching a contest to harness the advertising community’s creativity for the benefit of its partner, Dr Clown, says Astral’s press release. The challenge of this contest was to develop a campaign that could be deployed on Astral Media’s three media platforms – television, radio and outdoor advertising – and which would promote the Dr Clown cause while focusing on raising funds for the organization. The multi-platform campaign will be produced without cost thanks to the generosity of the Fabrique d’images, Astral Media Radio and Astral Media Outdoor.
"It has been a year since we began our partnership with Dr Clown, and in that time we are very pleased with the visibility that we have been able to accord the organization," said Alain Bergeron, vice-president of brand management and corporate communications. "In addition to our commitment of air-time, we have been impressed with the level of engagement that our employees and departments have shown for the organization. Not only have various individual departmental efforts raised considerable funds for the organization, employees have shown an immense openness to participate in activities and are currently planning several fund-raising events."
