Rescuing Food Through Humor

DraftFCB Launches Microsite to Help City Harvest

Posted by Karen Egolf on 10.27.09 @ 04:59 PM

In an effort to draw people's attention to a serious issue, DraftFCB is offering humorous videos to encourage people to rescue food for New York's City Harvest. The agency launched a microsite, Rescue Food, that features animated vignettes created pro bono by top animators to solicit funds and food.

"To make the City Harvest brand distinct and relatable, we focused on its unique mission," said Keith Loell, executive creative director, in a statement about the campaign. "With this in mind, we amassed a diverse and immensely talented group of animators, directors, writers and musicians who donated their time to bring the vision to life. What resulted was a collection of adventurous, short animations."

The videos include such pieces as "High Steaks Poker," about a gambler whose love of cards gets him into some "fishy" and serious trouble (by Creative Coordinator William Tran and Broadcast Producer Michelle Carman, with David Michael Friend, art director for computer animation house SpeakeasyFX) and "Fried Green Tomatoes," which tells the story of infamous outlaw Johnny Beefsteak (by Rob Rooney, senior VP-creative director, and Mr. Tran, with animation by World Leaders Entertainment).

City Harvest, which has been serving New York for more than 25 years, fights hunger by rescuing food that would otherwise go to waste and distributing it to city food programs. This year, the organization will collect more than 25 million pounds of excess food from the food industry, including restaurants, grocers, corporate cafeterias, manufacturers and farms, then deliver it free of charge to about 600 community food programs.