Sky has revealed Serious Tissues as the Grand Prix winner of its 2022 Sky Zero Footprint Fund initiative – a £2m advertising fund which supports and aims to inspire others to join the journey to Net Zero Carbon. The fund was established in 2021 to aid the acceleration and amplification of initiatives to drive behavioural change and tangible impact towards a more sustainable future.
Serious Tissues, which produces 100% recycled toilet roll, was selected as the winner of the Grand Prix £1m media value prize ahead of Sky’s other four finalists – Ecosia, Homethings, Royal Mail, and WUKA – at a showcase held yesterday. All five shortlisted businesses have already secured £250,000 as part of the scheme with Serious Tissues receiving an extra £750k in media value.
“Winning this prize is absolutely game changing for us,” said Chris Baker, Co-founder of Serious Tissues. “It’s tough starting a business, going up against huge players. So many brands are looking to disrupt and would benefit from the power of TV to reach mass audiences. We are so grateful to have been given this opportunity by Sky to access TV advertising in such an early stage of our business, something we never thought was possible.”
Martin McAllister, Co-founder of Serious Tissues added, “We want to congratulate all of the finalists for not only their brilliant ads but also their efforts towards a sustainable future. It has been an absolute blast getting to know everyone through the process and are already excited about making the most of the prize.”
The decision was made last month at the Curzon Soho in London following presentations from each brand, where they unveiled their sustainable ads. The winning campaign was selected by a panel of expert judges with extensive experience in advertising, creativity and sustainability. Judges included advertising legend Sir John Hegarty, Su-Mei Thompson (CEO of the Media Trust), Stephen Woodford (Chair of the Advertising Association), Fiona Ball (Group Director of Bigger Picture at Sky), Gideon Spanier (UK Editor in chief of Campaign), Juliet Davenport (Founder of Good Energy and Author of The Green Start-up), Bruce Crouch (Executive Creative Director of Hatch London), and Tara Chandra (Co-Founder and CEO of Here We Flo).
Judges were extremely impressed with all the final creatives presented, but after tough deliberation, Serious Tissues secured the Grand Prix million-pound prize because of its “category changing product” and the compelling way their mission was displayed throughout their advert.
Sarah Jones Director of Planning at Sky Media commented, “We’re thrilled that we were able to bring back the Sky Zero Footprint Fund for a second year. This takes our total investment to £4m of advertising value that’s helping drive sustainable behaviour change.
All five of our winners will play a key role in encouraging the nation to make changes to help the planet, using the power of TV. I want to issue a huge congratulations to Serious Tissues for winning the £1m Grand Prix, against a group of outstanding pitches.”
The five winning ads were all produced following best practice advice and recommendations from the Advertising Association’s AdGreen programme. The ad campaigns will roll-out in early 2023.
Established by Sky, the Footprint Fund is part of the Sky Zero campaign to be net zero carbon by 2030. The five finalists of Sky Zero’s Footprint Fund are:
About Ecosia
Headquartered in Berlin, Germany, Ecosia is the world’s largest not-for-profit search engine. The tech company dedicates 100% of its profits to the planet and has collaborated with local communities in over 35 countries to plant more than 160 million trees. In 2014 Ecosia was the first company in Germany to be accredited as a B Corporation and in 2017 it built the first of a growing portfolio of solar plants, which now produce enough energy to power all searches twice over. In 2018 Ecosia gave away its shares to the Purpose Foundation, to assure that it can never be sold and that no one, including the founder, can profit or receive dividends from the company. Ecosia was founded by Christian Kroll in 2009.
About Homethings
Homethings is on a mission to change the way the world cleans. After discovering that most household cleaning sprays are 90% water, packaged in single-use plastic bottles, co-founders Matt Aubrey and Tim Keaveney set out to create a more sustainable solution that would keep our homes (and the planet) clean. In September 2020, they launched Homethings; a revolutionary series of waterless, refillable and reusable cleaning sprays that consumers activate by adding water at home – just add tap™. Their innovative, non-toxic range of effervescent tabs are vegan and their refillable bottles are made of 100% post-consumer recyclable plastic, helping to not only limit single-use plastic waste but also reduce the carbon emissions produced from shipping water-based concentrates.
About Royal Mail
Royal Mail is the leading provider of postal and delivery services in the UK and the UK’s designated universal postal service provider. Through the Royal Mail Core Network, the company delivers a one-price-goes-anywhere service on a range of parcels and letters products. Royal Mail has the capability to deliver to more than 31 million addresses in the UK, six days a week (excluding UK public holidays). Royal Mail’s 90,000 posties walk over a billion steps a day, helping make the company the greenest option for delivering parcels, based on competitors’ reported emissions**. We have an ambitious plan to be Net Zero by 2040 and reduce the average carbon emissions per parcel it delivers in the UK from 205gCO2e today to 50gCO2e. It’s the same as making a cup of tea with milk. **When measured in terms of the CO2e emissions per parcel reported by the UK parcel delivery companies who currently publicly report these statistics
About Serious Tissues
Serious Tissues is the UK’s first carbon neutral toilet roll, who plant trees with every sale. 10 million trees are cut down every year for toilet paper, which Serious Tissue think is roughly 10 million too many. Especially at a time when we need trees now, more than ever. That’s why they started Serious Tissues. Made from 100% recycled paper, office reports that no one really looked at and celebrity gossip mags tossed in the recycling – possibly even from a few bits of artwork sent home from nursery. All the stuff that would have been chucked otherwise. So not only do Serious Tissues reduce your carbon footprint, save trees and shrink landfill, they also help with reforestation. It is also made right here in the UK. So, no shipping from halfway around the world. And while we’re at it no individual wrapping, no plastic, no dyes, perfumes, no unnecessary chemicals. In just over 2 years, they’ve planted over 1.4 million trees, proving that it is possible to change the world from your toilet seat.
About WUKA
WUKA is a period health company that creates comfortable and sustainable period-proof underwear, swim & sportswear. They completely replace the need for a disposable pad or tampon and save money, up to 50% savings compared to the leading pad or tampon over two years. WUKA are better for the planet and have a 5-6x smaller carbon footprint and replace at least 200 disposables in their lifetime. Available online and in Planet Organic, Morrisons, Ocado, Superdrug, Urban Outfitters, Wholefoods and many independent stockists.
