The Shop That Nearly Wasn’t

There are more cancer survivors being made every day. But not for all cancers.
Breakthrough Cancer Research directly fund the research to find new treatments for poor prognosis cancers – to achieve 100% survival for 100% of cancers.
To raise more funding to tackle survival inequality, we needed to raise awareness- to show a new generation the good they could do and the hope research creates every day.

On World Cancer Day, The Shop That Nearly Wasn’t, the World’s First Shop 100% Stocked and Staffed by Cancer Survivors opened Dublin and online.
Stocked with books, jewellery, art and tech it was a showcase for the talent we would have lost, if not for cancer research.
However one part of the shop remained empty – to highlight the fact that more funding and research is needed in order to help more people with cancers like pancreatic and lung with survival rates as low as 9% or 14% survive – sooner.
Visitors could donate to fill this space.

The integrated campaign could not have been made without survivors – filming their stories, creating new products and even survivors creating the campaign assets.

A phased campaign encouraged sharing and earned media take-up.

1. The Call Out
   An animated social call-out was designed to find cancer survivors who were also creators
2. Creating their stories
   Each cancer survivor shared their journey and promoted their products
3. Media buy
   With a small budget and a desire to keep any savings to fund research, the strength of the idea would have to create our reach. Print, Radio, Online and Social created enough awareness to generate interest.
4. Celebrity and Influencer participation
   High profile cancer survivors including Michael Flatley; Senator David Norrisfilm and television director Stephen Bradley; award-winning children’s book author and illustrator Peter Donnelly; donated products or lent their talents
5. Creating the Events
   An events series to encourage repeat visits and sharing and listed and ticketed through Eventbrite were all hosted by cancer survivors.
   The events were free in lieu of donations.
6. Dedicated website
   A dedicated ecommerce site www.theshopthatnearlywasnt.ie was created to promote the campaign, events and to sell products.

Results
With a budget of less than €25,000 for print, radio and online and to-date campaign reach of 3.18 million without any paid media partnership the initiative was a huge success for the organization.

Engagement on Breakthrough Cancer Research’s social media pages increased by 1200% with more than 52,000 engaging with the campaign. It had a reach of more than 2.5 million.

Website visits were up by 297% , with 67.5k engagements, up 10,500% and a reach of 1.9m.

Calls and email enquiries to Breakthrough Cancer Research increased by 125%.

Website visits and social followers grew by over 1200%.

Over the week thousands visited the shop, travelling from all over Dublin and as far as Galway, Kerry, Wexford, Cork and Northern Ireland.

Breakthrough Cancer Research are currently working with global organizations to bring the Shop around the world and continue to campaign against survival inequality through better-funded research.