Cummins&Partners, Mango Communications and Initiative Media have helped John West Australia to win the Best Engagement Campaign at the Ethical Corporation’s Responsible Business Awards in London, for the first time.

Early this year, John West completed the overhaul of its supply chain so that it only sources tuna certified by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), the world’s best standard in sustainability. That was the easy part, as it turned out.

Cummins&Partners was given the job of communicating the upgrade to consumers. The agency soon discovered that many people don’t fully understand what “sustainable” means and therefore don’t really grasp its importance.

As champion Australian surfer, Layne Beachley, stated for the campaign, “People don’t understand what they’ve got until it’s taken away.”

So Cummins&Partners set about to dramatise the possibility of a world without fish thanks to unsustainable fishing methods. To do that, the agency and John West launched a fake tuna brand called Finnish Tuna, in partnership with MSC and WWF. They distributed cans of Finnish Tuna to unsuspecting commuters. When these people opened the cans, they found that there was nothing in them but water and a message, “Imagine a world without fish.”

The campaign became the catalyst for Australians to begin making more environmentally responsible decisions.

This was followed by the introduction of the John West Unlimited Edition Can, highlighting that John West tuna had become MSC certified and John West committed to reaching $1m for WWF ocean conservation projects, helping to ensure we have healthy oceans forever.

The Ethical Corporation’s Responsible Business Awards is the world’s leading celebration of sustainability and responsible business. It applauds the world’s leading organisations in CSR, sustainable supply chains and communications.