2026 Winner

CASE SUMMARY

The Alberta Cancer Foundation faced the daunting challenge of cutting through the extreme noise of the Q4 holiday season – specifically Black Friday and Giving Tuesday – to drive donations and deepen brand affinity. In a competitive non-profit landscape where every charity is vying for media attention on Giving Tuesday, the Foundation needed a strategy that moved beyond traditional appeals to show the tangible impact of a donation.
The strategy reframed the Foundation’s mission of providing “more moments” into a concept everyone intrinsically understands: time. They brought this intangible exchange to life through the Time Store, a retail pop-up where shoppers could “purchase” boxes labeled with years of life for Albertans facing cancer.
The Alberta Cancer Foundation entered the final quarter of the year with the objective of deepening brand affinity while driving significant year-over-year donation growth. However, the campaign had to overcome several critical hurdles:
The idea needed to be high-impact yet fiscally responsible, relying heavily on earned media to amplify the message.
The messaging had to compete with the aggressive commercial noise of Black Friday and the saturated charitable environment of Giving Tuesday.
The strategy was executed against a backdrop of a national downturn in charitable giving, with 7% fewer Canadians donating compared to the previous year. This meant we weren’t just fighting for attention; they were fighting a contracting market where fewer Canadians were opening their wallets.
The Foundation’s mission – to give patients “more moments”– can easily feel like an abstract concept to donors who want to see the physical, tangible impact of their dollars.
The target? Active and prospective donors across Alberta, especially Edmonton and Calgary, skewing 35 (with a sweet spot of 55). This audience is emotionally invested (94% have a personal connection to cancer) and most hold spiritual beliefs that motivate charitable giving during the holidays.
The agency realized that donors aren’t just helping create “more moments” – they are buying more time for families facing cancer.
They created “The Time Store”, a physical retail experience where the intangible promise of research and support for Albertans facing cancer was packaged into tangible products: “One More Year,” “Five More Years,” and “10 More Years,” of life.
The campaign was executed through a strategic content-first model across three distinct phases to ensure the physical activation had a province-wide footprint:
They opened a two day retail pop-up in Edmonton. This was not just a store but a content studio designed to capture the raw, emotional reactions of Albertans as they encountered the idea of “buying time” for loved ones.
They planned a layered media campaign building up to Giving Tuesday.
The footage from the Edmonton pop-up became the heart of the campaign. A 2-minute hero film was released via owned channels two weeks before Giving Tuesday. 30s and 15s versions were deployed across TV, YouTube, and digital platforms.
To ensure provincial resonance, they deployed a dual-track radio strategy. The agency ran a 16-market rural radio campaign with creative developed by the Foundation – tailored to regions with local cancer centres – to build broad brand affinity. They also ran personalized announcer-read spots in Calgary leading up to and on Giving Tuesday to drive immediate traffic to the local “Time Store” activation.
The Foundation led a heavy PR push promoting “The Time Store”, targeting journalists and influencers to drive earned media.
On Giving Tuesday, they opened the store once more at Calgary’s Chinook Centre. This served as a one-day fundraising blitz and a major media event, bringing the campaign to a crescendo at the most critical time for donations.
The first area of strategic value lay in reframing the value proposition. By moving from the abstract idea of “more moments” to the visceral “buying time,” planning successfully aligned the Foundation’s mission with the high stakes commercial behaviours of the holiday season – while communicating the value proposition in a universally understandable way.
Another major contribution was the purposeful integration of media planning from the very start of the campaign conceptualization and planning process, which allowed them to bridge the gap between two short term physical events and a province-wide campaign.
This holistic approach facilitated the two-phased activation: first, capturing high-impact content during the first Time Store activation in Edmonton, then deploying a targeted media spend to amplify that footage leading up to the second activation in Calgary. This ensured the live activation remained the heart of the campaign while extending its resonance Alberta-wide – allowing those who weren’t there in person to experience the full emotional impact of the brand.
Bringing “The Time Store” to life delivered the most successful Giving Tuesday in the Foundation’s 40-year history, driving an 11% year-over-year increase in donations – including an immediate $10,000 gift inspired by a morning radio spot – and a 68% boost in Q4 new donor acquisition with 1,029 new donors. The campaign achieved massive reach with 50.4M editorial impressions across 10+ outlets and 25 influencers, alongside social dominance (73% engagements, 521% impressions, 239% shares). Furthermore, smart media negotiation yielded $61,694 in added value ($1.42 per dollar spent), while positive sentiment surged 5,000%, leaving 82% of Albertans with a favorable impression and 63% agreeing the message inspired hope.
The success of “The Time Store” has fundamentally altered the Alberta Cancer Foundation’s long-term marketing trajectory. What began as a Q4 campaign to cut through holiday noise has evolved into an ongoing creative platform that the Foundation is using to anchor its brand storytelling – now, and in the future.

Credits

Jeff McLean, Creative Director
Krystin Royan, Copywriter
Kiri Wysynski, Planner
Rob Jennings, Planner
Émilie Hayes, Service Delivery
Tania Nease , Media Director
Manon Lamarre, Media Strategist
Mark Watson, Designer
Vignettes, Environmental Design
Hoopla Media, Video Production
Alberta Cancer Foundation, Media Relations
John Sexsmith, Special Acknowledgement
Blakely Fundraising , Special Acknowledgement