There are many conventional ways of campaigning to help people facing homelessness and/or to end homelessness. Here are 5 unconventional approaches.

Crisis: Impossible to Ignore

Literally, a big idea. This film complemented a giant sculpture of a homeless man, which was installed on streets in London and Birmingham. A very visible campaign aiming to make the issue of homelessness much more visible.

 HSBC/Shelter: Vicious Circle

Made by HSBC in conjunction with Shelter, exposing the vicious circle of “no home – no address – no bank account – no job – no home”. The ad doesn’t just show the relentlessness of the vicious circle, but makes you feel it.

Sleeping Flags: The Bags We Never Wanted to Make

This Irish veterans charity uses the taboo about the flag touching the ground to highlight the much greater sin of having former soldiers sleeping on the ground. Powerfully bitter.

St Mungo’s: Wake Up to Homelessness

This is a smart idea to capture the idea that homelessness doesn’t just apply to “them” but, with just a sharp change of fortune, could easily apply to “us”.

Situation Stockholm

Situation Stockholm is a Swedish street newspaper, much like the UK’s Big Issue. It is sold by people trying to escape homelessness, but faces the problem (as does the Big Issue), of people seeing the sellers as beggars rather than as entrepreneurs. By adopting whole-heartedly the visual and verbal grammar of the business magazine profile, this campaign challenges those preconceptions.
(Note – Di is Sweden’s equivalent of the FT)

Hope is a marketing, creative and branding agency for charities and other social-purpose organisations. The Ideas Lab examines what makes effective (or ineffective) communications for these causes, charities and social-impact businesses.