The solution was to make the Oxfam Trailwalker more than just a walk for a cause by building it into a community that brought people, companies and their beliefs together.

After carefully analysing the Oxfam Trailwalker, we finally settled on the idea “Walk the Change” as it made people feel like they were striving for something larger; that they were making a positive impact in the world, by actively being a part of the change they wanted to create.

Taking from the concept of our seed idea, “being a part of a life changing experience”, we created a visual style inspired by topography. Topography, being a representation of the course of change over time, was used to create a visual depiction of the purposeful and adventurous nature of the Trailwalker challenge. To give our audience a 360° experience of the Trailwalker, our communication took place over four stages:

Building the brand – through point-of-purchase displays and brand ambassadors

Launching the event – by setting up live chats, memorable on-ground experiences, inspirational signboards and interactive photo ops

Post-event engagement – by keeping the conversation going with online blogs, articles and user-generated content

With 499 teams taking part, 80% participation from corporates, over 600 volunteers, and an estimated ₹5.5 crores raised (compared to the ₹4.7 crores raised the previous year), Oxfam Trailwalker 2017-18 saw more enthusiasm, energy and determination than ever before.

The word Kunji in Hindi means a key. In our context, it was meant to represent the literal key to understanding how the climate is likely to change in the coming years and how it will affect different at-risk areas. The book held details of the likely impact of Climate Change in the locality (over 30 years) and the optimum MGNREGA projects to tackle its effects.

On analysing typical communication targeted at this consumer, we realised that most messaging took a very prescriptive approach. Keeping this in mind, we needed to ensure we didn’t put out a preachy message, but effectively communicated that village residents now had the ability to cope with the ill-effects of climate change.

The ideal case for the Climate Kunji book was to be used during Panchayat meetings to help decide the nature of projects undertaken as part of the MNREGA scheme.

We identified our goal as wanting to get village residents to ask for the tool to be used. Hence the line – Gaon ko bolo, Kunji kholo!

Climate change was personified as an unwelcome guest who had come to the village in the form of “Bhayanak Babu”. This was relatable and helped us effectively highlight the problem. We also gave the character multiple forms to indicate varying levels of intensity.

The characters created to combat climate change – needed to be reliable and confident figures that everyone could look up to. They were knowledgeable, and problem-solvers. We gave them crisp clothes and a neat appearance to signify their authoritative demeanor.

To make the message more relevant to our audience, we used the elements of theatrical ‘Naatak’ in our narrative structure, language and sound. This meant using simple literary devices like repetition, rhyming and metaphors. The overall story was created with an overarching narrator telling a story in the form of a song to ensure higher recall.

When it came to the game, we needed to ensure it is easy to play, portable and could be enjoyed by women, children and men, alike.

We therefore selected a card game for its simplicity and relatability. Capitalising on the audience’s familiarity with card games, we chose to name it ‘Patta Patta’.

We needed to create a simple flyer that was economical to print, and clearly communicated our message. We chose to keep the messaging similar to our video and game by focusing on the idea of “Gaon ko bolo, Kunji kholo!”.