Brownes enlists the people of Perth to save the WA dairy industry via new Meerkats campaign

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Brownes 1.jpgBrownes Dairy has joined forces with the people of Perth in a special campaign that broadcasts a message of support to the State’s hard-working dairy farmers.

Launched this week, Brownes’ Save WA Dairy campaign enlisted the help of 15 regular West Australians who, like Brownes, have an extraordinary passion for protecting the WA Dairy industry. These people will become familiar faces over the coming months as they appear in a series of television ads with their personal message of support to farmers in the South West.

Brownes Managing Director Ben Purcell said there is a serious issue behind the campaign, created by Meerkats, with more than 300 million litres of milk trucked into WA from the East Coast every year in the form of yoghurt, cheese and other dairy products, when local dairy farmers have the capacity to supply the entire State if given a fair price.

“We know from the most recent industry report conducted by the WA Farmers’ Federation that returns to dairy farmers are critically inadequate, and that many operators are facing the wall simply because they struggle to get a fair return,” he said.

“That same report from the end of 2012 said the industry will be in dire straits if that doesn’t change. At Brownes, we’re not going to just sit back and watch that happen.”

In April this year, Brownes issued a call to arms to people who are fed up with seeing imported milk filling supermarket shelves, ripping off WA farmers and sending profits back to the Eastern States. The response was overwhelming as people from all walks of life rallied to show their support for WA Dairy.

Brownes_2.jpgPurcell said the Save WA Dairy campaign demonstrated people were genuinely passionate about buying locally-made dairy products.  

“From the response we received, it’s clear that like us, people are sick of seeing imported dairy products in our supermarkets,” Purcell said. “This campaign is about getting that message to our farmers in the South West and letting them know that their hard work doesn’t go unnoticed.”

The Save WA Dairy campaign follows Brownes’ hugely-successful and award winning Use Buy Date campaign, which last year saw close to 10,000 empty imported yoghurt cartons personally returned to the Eastern States by Purcell and a team from Brownes.

Meerkats managing director Gavin Bain said: “Last year we helped launch Brownes’ Use Buy Date campaign in which farmers sent a message to the WA people about the threat of imported dairy products. In this latest campaign, we’ve essentially used the same production techniques, but reversed the messaging so it’s now about the people of WA broadcasting their support to the State’s farmers.

“It’s all about getting the message back to farmers that they’re not alone and that the people of WA understand the hard work they do on a daily basis.”   

All production of the campaign was done by Meerkats in-house and the techniques used were the same as that used in last year’s Use Buy Date campaign, which won this year’s Campaign Brief WA Campaign of the Year award.