Every dog (or pet) deserves to find a fur-ever home.
In the first half of 2025, more than a million dogs entered shelters across America… and the great thing about this is that nearly a million of them were adopted by loving fur parents.
Nevertheless, not every dog finds a home, leaving those who aren’t adopted to continue their stay in the shelter system.
It’s an unfortunate reality… but it doesn’t have to stay that way.
That’s why Pedigree, the go-to brand for pet treats, came up with a way to make the process easier for dogs that are waiting to be adopted.
How?
Well, you’ll have to keep reading to find out!
Helping Dogs Find their Forever Home
Image from Unsplash
Pedigree has operated as pet food brands for decades.
Throughout the company’s decades of operation, it has leveraged thousands of ads to promote its products.
In those ads, trained actor dogs were utilized to film footage.
… but what if those ads featured dogs who are up for adoption instead?
Hmmm good idea…
In 2024, Pedigree turned that remote possibility into reality. To accomplish this vision, the brand partnered with animation company Nexus Studios and advertising agency Colenso BBDO.
Nexus Studios and Pedigree created an artificial intelligence (AI) model that transformed the image of a shelter dog into high quality studio images.
The high quality image is then mapped into a CGI rig, rendering the photo usable for any type of ad placement, be it digital or traditional.
Image from Ads of the World
The twist?
Behind every ad is an actual dog that’s waiting to be adopted!
Pedigree utilized geolocation data to strategically place these ads. This meant the specific dogs featured in the ad placements were waiting in shelters located near the people who saw them.
The “Adoptable” campaign, as Pedigree called it, saw instant success when it was rolled out in New Zealand in 2024.
In just 2 weeks, 50% of dogs that were featured were adopted. Moreover, shelters saw 6x uptick in visits.
The campaign was so successful that Pedigree is working on a global rollout.
What’s more?
“Adoptable” earned various awards from prestigious awards-giving bodies such as D&AD and Clio Awards.
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Pedigree, in its “Adoptable” campaign, showed just how powerful guerrilla marketing can be, even when it’s an established brand that’s using the strategy.
By leveraging its brand equity to encourage pet adoption, the company not only drew eyeballs to its brand but also managed to pull off a high impact awareness campaign at the same time.
In a world that’s tired of generic outreach efforts, Pedigree and its creative partners managed to pull off a one-of-a-kind, highly beneficial, and impactful campaign.
About The Dynamic Marketing Communiqué’s
“Fridays: Gorillas of Guerrilla Marketing”
Jay Conrad Levinson (1984) said that Guerrilla Marketing “works because it’s simple to appreciate, easy to execute, and inexpensive.”
Guerrilla Marketing is unconventional.
Looking beyond the traditional ways of advertising, marketers and advertisers need to spice things up in order for their brand to have campaigns that not only make an impact but also stick to their target market’s mind.
Guerrilla Marketing usually aims to have direct contact with consumers.
This type of direct contact should spark an emotional reaction that leads to consumers effectively remembering the brand.
It’s about making a big impression and making that impression last a long time (if not forever).
Guerrilla Marketing can be inexpensive.
The effect of this is being able to create a buzz around the brand, and the strategy used to market it. Almost everything is passed around through word-of-mouth.
Word-of-mouth is one of the greatest outcomes and it usually doesn’t cost anything.
This is every business’ or brand’s dream!
Every Friday, we publish tips, examples, and other useful content on unconventional ways of marketing and promotion.
Learn more about how to grab your target market’s attention and make an amazing first and lasting impression without having to spend a lot of money.
Businesses don’t really need to spend much for a guerrilla campaign. You do not need a big budget to be successful. You just need creativity and a good imagination.
Hope you find this week’s guerrilla marketing insight interesting and helpful.
Stay tuned for next Friday’s “Gorillas of Guerrilla Marketing!”
Cheers,
Dyane Diasanta
Senior Content Writer
Valens Dynamic Marketing Capabilities
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