| hikaye | All Torontonians want for Christmas is an affordable place to live. But the cost of housing in the city is through the roof. Home prices have climbed almost 30% in the last four years alone, which means the average Torontonian would need to save for almost 20 years to set aside enough for a down payment. We wanted to bring greater awareness to this issue and what better time of year to do it than the holidays, when people think of gathering at home with family and friends. To do so, we partnered with Houselink and Mainstay Community Housing, a Toronto based non-profit advocacy group, and built a campaign aimed at driving awareness and also donations to this important local affordable housing initiative. Entry Description The cost of homes in Toronto has been so high for so long, it seems Torontonians have almost become desensitized to it. If we were going to break through to this audience, we needed to present the problem in a new, unexpected way, especially during the holidays. So, we created a 1:1 scale model of a Toronto bungalow, built entirely of gingerbread. The home measured just one square foot and included a fully scaled living room, bedroom, bathroom, and unfinished basement (although arguably, you’d wanna finish this one!). The bungalow was then s listed for $1000; roughly the cost of a square foot of real estate in the Toronto market. We then launched our own real estate brokerage firm and listed the bite-sized “home” on Toronto realty sites, including Facebook Marketplace and Kijiji. Professional photography, a realtor walk-through video, and a window display in our office storefront, helped our listing feel all the more real, and dive all the more interest. After highlighting its many features – curb appeal, plenty of natural light – the listing went on to acknowledge that, sadly, this tiny home was not for sale, but was designed to call attention to the city’s housing crisis. We then encouraged readers to make a donation to Houselink and Mainstay Community Housing (HLMS), Toronto’s largest non-profit housing agency. Impact: While we couldn’t hold an open-house for our “Gingerbread House-ing Crisis” campaign, people did open their eyes to the issue, and their wallets, to Houselink and Mainstay Community Housing, helping to make housing affordable for all Torontonians: • 15% Increase in Donations YOY (vs. Dec 2022) • 80.2M Earned Impressions • 1.02K Listing visits • Coverage by Adweek, BlogTO, Campaign, and The Globe & Mail “The biggest win for us was that you did actively raise issues around housing costs and homelessness with a much wider audience than we would normally reach. The additional publicity via BlogTO would have boosted our profile with a new demographic very effectively.” Patty Letourneau Fund Development Manager, Houselink and Mainstay Community Housing |
