Skip a Meal – Latet Israel 2017 | Clapboard Ad Archive

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Skip a Meal - Latet | Clapboard Ad Archive

Latet’s Skip a Meal campaign, launched in Year by Saatchi & Saatchi in Israel, represents a powerful intersection of behavioral insight and digital creativity in the public service category, leveraging the digital holiday rush for recipes to reframe a trivial online gesture into a pointed act of empathy. Instead of displaying the reality of hunger through confronting images or testimonials, Saatchi & Saatchi secured partnerships with the country’s leading recipe and food websites—content platforms that see peak engagement during holiday periods—modifying their video players with a reimagined skip ad button, this time recast as an invitation to skip a meal. The brilliance of the concept lies in appropriating a ubiquitous interaction—viewers’ instinctive urge to bypass advertising interruptions—turning it into a metaphorical and actionable appeal: just as users routinely skip over digital clutter, Latet asks them to symbolically forgo a meal and translate that abstention into a tangible donation to address food insecurity. This campaign sits squarely within Clapboard’s FORMAT#3—Symbolize the Problem—where the creative narrative is built around a symbolic proxy that stands in for the issue at hand rather than depicting hardship directly, using familiar technology behavior as the emotional lever. The Skip a Meal execution demonstrates how a simple UI change, amplified through trusted online environments and habitual digital actions, can produce a subtle but resonant reframing of a societal challenge without resorting to donor fatigue or guilt. By embedding social purpose seamlessly into moments of aspirational content consumption, the work sidesteps heavy-handedness and wins engagement by aligning with audience intention and context—peaking at precisely the time when cultural cues around abundance, generosity, and food are foremost in mind. The campaign also underscores the evolving role of collaboration between NGOs, publishers, and tech platforms in public interest communication, showing that engineered product tweaks and contextual partnerships often speak louder than standard cause appeals or disruptive stunts. Skip a Meal leverages the power of analogy, digital design, and timing in a way that signals a maturation of the symbolic approach in issue-led marketing, using frictionless digital participation to prompt real-world impact while avoiding the pitfalls of emotional manipulation. Clapboard rates this 66/100. By reengineering an everyday online action into a vehicle for social action at a national scale, this campaign spotlights how thoughtful digital interventions can effectively recode mainstream behaviors for the greater good when the creative and the context are perfectly aligned.

Credits

Client

Latet

Agency

Saatchi & Saatchi

Creative Director

Idan Levi

Art Director

Carmel Gilan

Copywriter

Eddie Gartsman

Crew

Eva Hasson

Category Mind Map

48%

The "Skip a Meal" campaign by Latet, launched in Israel during the 2017 holiday season, leverages a unique digital intervention to raise awareness about food insecurity. By partnering with major Israeli websites that experience high traffic from users seeking holiday recipes, the campaign strategically inserted a "Skip ad" button into their video players. This feature symbolically invited viewers to "skip a meal" rather than a commercial, prompting reflection on the reality faced by many who cannot afford sufficient food. The campaign’s core brand proposition centers on encouraging empathy and social responsibility, urging the public to consider the value of what they might forgo temporarily to help those in need. From a market strategy perspective, the campaign identifies a behavioral insight: during holidays, users actively search for recipe content, often encountering online video ads. By redirecting this habitual digital interaction, the campaign transforms a typical ad-skipping behavior into a provocative call-to-action aligned with Latet’s mission in the public interest sector. The targeted digital touchpoint ensures relevance and engagement by integrating seamlessly into the user experience on popular platforms. The creative angle—reframing an ad-skip as a meal-skip—functions as a social experiment, subtly challenging audiences to rethink their consumption choices. This approach not only maximizes visibility through collaboration with multiple high-traffic websites but also amplifies the campaign’s social message by embedding it in an everyday online behavior, fostering greater awareness and potential action toward reducing hunger.

FORMAT#3 SYMBOLIZE THE PROBLEM — Uses symbols or analogies to represent the problem instead of showing it literally. This campaign, 'Skip a Meal' by Latet, leverages the symbolic act of modifying a digital “Skip ad” button into a “Skip a meal” button on popular recipe sites during the holidays. Instead of presenting hunger or poverty directly, it uses this familiar online function as a metaphor for voluntarily skipping a meal to highlight the issue of food insecurity. The device is not a story or testimonial, nor does it demonstrate a product in a literal or comparative way; rather, it ingeniously symbolizes the problem of hunger through digital behavior, prompting viewers to relate their action (skipping an ad/meal) to the real-life plight of those without enough to eat. This direct analogy is central, making SYMBOLIZE THE PROBLEM the best fit for the campaign’s creative technique. ADVERTISING FORMATS EXPLAINED: https://www.clapboard.com/blog/branding-and-advertising/brand-strategy/12-advertising-creative-formats

1. Leket Israel – As Israel’s largest food bank, Leket Israel positions itself as the primary facilitator of food rescue and redistribution, emphasizing efficiency in reducing food waste and hunger. Their strategic angle centers on mobilizing volunteers and food industry partnerships to address immediate nutritional needs while promoting sustainability. 2. The Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel (SPNI) – While primarily ecological, SPNI’s social campaigns often intersect with public interest themes. They differentiate by linking environmental preservation with community well-being, promoting holistic societal health rather than solely individual aid. 3. Yad Sarah – Yad Sarah focuses on providing medical and rehabilitative equipment and services to vulnerable populations, positioning itself as a vital enabler of independent living and healthcare access, thereby complementing basic needs support with health-related social aid. 4. Israel Food Bank – As a dedicated food distribution organization, Israel Food Bank differentiates through its extensive network and focus on timely food provisioning to low-income families and elderly residents, leveraging data-driven distribution to maximize impact. 5. Hafuch al Hafuch – This NGO uniquely combines youth empowerment with social welfare programs, positioning itself as a catalyst for social change by engaging marginalized populations in community development, thus addressing root causes of social inequality beyond immediate relief.

Q: What is Skip a Meal about? A: Skip a Meal is a professional campaign created by Saatchi & Saatchi for Latet, launched in Israel in 2017 within the public service market. The campaign targeted the holiday season, a time when many people visit major Israeli recipe websites, by partnering with these platforms to modify their video players. Instead of the usual skip ad button, users encountered a skip a meal button, which encouraged them to reflect on food insecurity and consider donating the value of a meal to those in need. This digital intervention used a familiar online behavior to highlight the issue of hunger in a culturally relevant and accessible way. Q: What creative device does Skip a Meal use? A: Skip a Meal employs the Symbolize the Problem technique, as classified by Clapboard’s 12-format taxonomy. Rather than depicting hunger or food insecurity directly, the campaign ingeniously repurposes the digital skip ad button into a skip a meal prompt. This symbolic gesture transforms a routine online action into a metaphor for voluntarily forgoing a meal, inviting viewers to empathize with those who lack food. By embedding this analogy within everyday digital behavior, the campaign leverages symbolism to provoke reflection and action, aligning with Clapboard’s FORMAT#3 approach. Q: What is the campaign proposition for Skip a Meal? A: The campaign proposition for Skip a Meal centers on encouraging empathy and social responsibility during the holiday season, when online recipe searches peak. Latet, through this campaign, asks viewers to consider the value of skipping a meal and to donate that amount to help those facing food insecurity. By integrating the message into high-traffic digital platforms, the campaign strategically reaches an audience already engaged in food-related content, making the call to action timely and relevant. This positioning reinforces Latet’s mission in the public interest sector by transforming habitual digital interactions into opportunities for meaningful social impact. Q: How does Skip a Meal rank in Clapboard's archive? A: Skip a Meal holds a Clapboard Campaign Score of 66/100 in Clapboard’s global ad archive. This score reflects the campaign’s creative ambition, execution quality, and cultural relevance as assessed by Clapboard’s curatorial standards. Q: Who are the competitors in Latet's category? A: In Latet’s public service and food security category, key competitors include Leket Israel, which leads in food rescue and redistribution through industry partnerships and volunteer mobilization; the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel, which connects ecological preservation with broader community well-being; Yad Sarah, known for providing medical and rehabilitative support to vulnerable populations; Israel Food Bank, which leverages a robust distribution network to serve low-income families and the elderly; and Hafuch al Hafuch, which integrates youth empowerment with social welfare to address systemic inequality. Each organization brings a distinct approach to addressing basic needs and societal health in Israel.