NoCagedEggs.com

Since its inception early this year, the campaign against battery cages has been like a magnet attracting to it donations of talent, generosity and an abundance of creativity and goods and services.

Creative gurus AKTIVIST - Adam Hunt, Maureen McCabe and Lisa McLeod kicked the campaign off by creating a powerful, multilayered ad campaign. The compelling TV, Cinema and viral ad "You Don't Have To Break A Chicken To Make An Egg" was produced by CARAVAN PICTURES and released to worldwide acclaim.

Read more about Life in the Battery Cage in our Subjects section.

Read more about The Life of Broiler Chickens in our Subjects section.

 

TV Ads (shown here)

Animal Liberation is indebted to the following people for their artistic contribution to our battery hen campaign.

Talented advertising people Scot Waterhouse, Andrew Cox, Kat Hinchey, Dane Robilliard and David Steindl came together to create two powerful and unique TV advertisements to highlight the plight of battery hens.

Their brief was to bring home to viewers that they, as individuals, have the power to end the cage system by no longer purchasing battery eggs. The brief also requested the ads not be graphic in the hope of getting a commercial television run.

That they succeeded on both counts is self evident with “Muffins” and “Supermarket” achieving a completely fresh way of bringing this message to the public. Unfortunately commercial networks, with the exception of NBN have refused to run the ads.

The ads also would not have been made without the remarkable gift of time and talent of the Film Construction production team including Director Maia Horniak, Producer Sally Power, Executive Producer Roy De Giorgio and crew and Gaby Muir and Mike Reed & Partners Post Production. People worked into the morning making egg carton mockups and started at 5am filming at About Life Supermarket (who donated their premises for four hours because they believe in what we are doing). Our thanks to the actors Chantel Munro, Julie Muir, Narelle Vallentine, Meridith Porteous, Alesandra Kitinas, Charlie Wynne and Henry Cox for their invaluable contribution to the ads.

Each and every person working on the ads did so because they believe the battery/cage system should be outlawed as there is no place in a society claiming to be civilised for this institutionalised cruelty.

The ads are also on Youtube, so they should reach a wide audience and help bring Australia into line with more compassionate legislation that has now seen Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, Germany, Austria and Norway ban the cage and by 2012 all European countries will ban the battery system. Last year California voted overwhelmingly to ban cage eggs and McDonalds in Europe and sundry other major food organisations have banned battery eggs. It is time for Australia to catch up with the rest of the industrialised word. You can help by sending copies of these ads to your networks of friends and get them to disperse throughout their networks. Help us to inform as many people as possible to use their consumer power to stop this cruelty.

The Campaign

The website NoCagedEggs.com showing the ad, the making of the ad and the savagery of the cage system was made possible by AKTIVIST and website maestro Suzy Rubinstein and Matt Delprado. The website also tells the story of Suzy, the star of the ad and posters, and one of 8 battery hens rescued from torture and misery and her journey to an idyllic sanctuary known as The Poultry Place.

 

AKTIVIST also created the compelling posters "After 300 eggs, they shred her." Thanks to Terry and Natalie of OVER EXPOSURE URBAN for donating 12 bus shelter billboards in Western Sydney that are currently showing the posters.

 

The NoCagedEggs.com advertising campaign was voted the No. 1 Breaking Ad Campaign by the advertising and media magazine, B&T (huge circulation).

 

There is not the space available here to thank the incredible amount of people who have contributed to this campaign but for starters - Adam Hunt, Lisa McLeod, Maureen McCabe, Emma Lawrence, Ben Lawrence, Anthony Grundy, Ben Scandrett-Smith, Julietta Boscolo, David Williamson, Matt Windon, Christian Luxton, Moses Fotofili,PeteDavies and Mario Pellegrino - all from CARAVAN and all donated their time. To Rita Azar and her family for permitting us to shoot the ad in their home. To Taylor Owynns, actor supremo! who went over and above to ensure the success of the ad. Sound Reservoir Sound Studio, Frame Set and Match Post Production our thanks for your generous donation of time and talent.

 

The ads and posters were released just prior to the Hearts For Hens awareness and fund raising day on 5th October 2006 in the centre of Sydney's CBD.

 

Anyone turning into Martin Place from the Wynyard end was greeted by a large traffic light flashing the message, "Hearts For Hens - NoCagedEggs.com" - thanks to Premier Hire who permitted the light to flashfrom7amuntilalmostmidnight.

 

The centre of Martin Place saw large posters and plasma screens showing footage of battery and free living hens plus the ad spooling throughout the day. Our thanks to the remarkable Greg Smith who made the screens and paid for the hire and installation of the plasmas, he also went through hours and hours of footage to compile the best illustrations to accompany the text.

 

Midpoint of all of this was Shane Dalgleish's Human Battery Cage - launched at Hearts For Hens prior to Shane and Drew Fryer embarking on a trip around Australia with this ambitious and unique project - you will be able to chart their ongoing progress via www.humanbatterycage.com. Joining our defeathered and semi-naked "battery human" Jodi in the cage were some lunchtime passers-by and many volunteers who gave a visual representation of the human equivalent of the confinementthatbatteryhensendure - at the end of the day though, we were all free to get out.

 

To those 50 Animal Liberation members, friends and Volunteering NSW members who gave up part or all of their working day to put on a yellow beak and collect donations, sit in the cage, get petitions signed and speak with the public about this campaign - thank you so much. And in particular our three brave chicken suited people Shatha Hamade, Lana Went and Stacy Dolbel who endeared themselves to all - it seems that everyone wants to hug a chicken!

 

Special thanks to Anthony Fletcher and Scott Krauss of Lower Eastside Studios and Fletcher Films Casting - you were there at the beginning of the campaign and throughout and again on the day with beaks and collection tins - thank you.

 

To the wonderful rescuers of Suzy and her sisters - thank you!

 

• Sweden and Switzerland no longer have battery cages. The EU is working toward having no more battery cages. Help Australia also become free of these terrible systems of producing eggs.......please consider your choice.