SAFE Project's 'The Snowball' by FCB Health New York uses animated storytelling to expose how winter months accelerate alcohol misuse and cirrhosis risk across
SAFE Project's The Snowball Reframes Winter Drinking as a Deadly Spiral
The Snowball is a three-minute animated public interest film created by FCB Health New York, an IPG Health company, for SAFE Project, released in the United States in January 2025 to expose how winter months accelerate alcohol misuse into life-threatening conditions including cirrhosis.
The campaign arrives at a culturally pointed moment. As millions of Americans adopt Dry January rituals, SAFE Project and FCB Health New York use the campaign to surface a less comfortable truth: that the cold, shortened days of winter create conditions in which alcohol consumption escalates dangerously rather than recedes. The central metaphor is literal and accumulative — a snowball gathering mass as it rolls, representing how what begins as seasonal drinking can compound into dependency, organ failure, and death. A companion resource hub, TheSnowball.org, extends the campaign beyond the film itself, offering immediate support for people struggling with alcohol misuse and for those caring for someone who is.
SAFE Project, founded in 2017 by Admiral James and Mary Winnefeld following the accidental opioid-overdose death of their nineteen-year-old son Jonathan, according to Safeproject Us, has steadily broadened its public health focus from opioid fatality prevention toward the wider landscape of addiction. The Snowball marks a deliberate expansion of that mission into alcohol misuse, building on the organisation's January 2024 alcohol-awareness campaign, It Ain't Five O'Clock Somewhere, according to adsoftheworld.com. In the United States, where Dry January has become a mainstream cultural event, the decision to launch in January 2025 places the campaign directly inside that conversation — not to celebrate sobriety as a trend, but to insist that for many people, stopping is not a one-month experiment but a life-or-death necessity. The campaign carries a Clapboard Score of 71 out of 100, reflecting strong creative craft and awards traction against a public interest objective where measurable behavioural outcomes remain difficult to verify.
SAFE Project targets a specific and underacknowledged consumer behaviour: the seasonal intensification of alcohol misuse during winter months in the United States. The strategic insight is epidemiological rather than attitudinal — cold, darker days correlate with increased consumption patterns that can tip casual drinkers toward dependency and existing heavy drinkers toward acute health crises including cirrhosis. By anchoring to January and the Dry January cultural moment, FCB Health New York creates a strategic inversion: the campaign does not celebrate those who can pause drinking, but rather speaks urgently to those for whom pausing is already too late or too difficult.
The competitive landscape for alcohol-related public health communication in the United States is shaped by the scale of the alcohol industry's own promotional activity. According to the World Federation of Advertisers, seven alcohol companies ranked among the world's one hundred largest advertisers in 2019, with a combined advertising investment above eighteen billion dollars, primarily directed at digital and social media. Against that volume, organisations like SAFE Project and peers such as the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence operate with fundamentally asymmetric resources, making creative impact and cultural resonance the primary competitive levers available. The World Health Organization's Global Alcohol Action Plan 2022–2030, as documented by Who Int, identifies advertising restrictions, reduced product availability, and accessible treatment as the most cost-effective public health interventions — a framework that contextualises The Snowball's emphasis on directing audiences toward immediate resources at TheSnowball.org and safeproject.us. FCB Health New York's decision to produce the campaign on a pro-bono basis, as reported by The One Club, reflects a resource model typical of mission-driven public interest work, concentrating investment entirely in creative execution rather than media spend.
The Snowball is produced by LOBO, the São Paulo-based creative studio, and directed by Mateus de Paula Santos, who also served as creative director, alongside co-directors Tiago Marcondes and Diogo Kalil, according to Little Black Book and motionographer.com. The production was led by head of production Marcelo Barbosa, with producers Rapha Stanzani and Jules Loyola, as credited by The Clio Awards. The film's visual language is built around the illusion of handmade stop-motion — paper sculptures and cutouts that appear to be physical, tactile objects — despite being produced as digital animation, according to Lobo Cx. This aesthetic choice is not incidental. The fragility and impermanence of paper as a material carries its own metaphorical weight: something constructed carefully, capable of being crumpled or destroyed, accumulating and compressing as the snowball grows.
The soundtrack is Billie Holiday's Everything I Have Is Yours, a selection described by the campaign itself as intentional given Holiday's own publicly documented battle with substance abuse. The pairing of a voice associated with beauty, sorrow, and addiction against imagery of silent, accumulating damage creates the emotional core of the film without requiring expository narration. According to dandad.org, the campaign received a D&AD Pencil specifically in the Existing Music category in 2025, a recognition that validates the soundtrack choice as a creative decision of craft-level significance rather than merely a tonal one. AI-driven tools were incorporated during the animation rendering stage to accelerate production, though MM+M, in coverage dated June 10, 2025, described the film as having been made by humans, not AI — reflecting the degree to which LOBO's handcrafted aesthetic obscured the computational assistance used in post-production. The result is a film that reads as intimate and analogue while operating at the technical scale the message demands.
The Snowball accumulates a significant awards record for a pro-bono public interest film. According to clios.com, the campaign received two Clio Health Silver awards in 2025 — one in Film Craft, Animation and one in Design Craft, Art Direction. According to oneclub.org, the film received a Bronze Pencil at The One Show in Health and Wellness, Craft and Art Direction, and an ADC Merit Honor in both Pharma, Health and Wellness Advertising and Art Direction, and Motion and Film Craft, Animation. According to dandad.org, the campaign received a D&AD Pencil in Existing Music in 2025. These recognitions span animation craft, art direction, sound, and health communication — a breadth that reflects how completely the film's individual components were executed.
No independently verified audience reach, conversion, or behavioural impact data for The Snowball is publicly available at the time of writing. The campaign's structural effectiveness, however, can be assessed through its architecture. The film functions as awareness-stage creative designed to move a specific audience — people in or adjacent to harmful drinking patterns during winter months in the United States — toward an accessible action: visiting TheSnowball.org or safeproject.us/alcohol for resources. The pro-bono model, the awards traction, and the January timing collectively maximise earned media potential in a category where paid distribution is resource-constrained. MediaPost covered the campaign in February 2025 in a positive and neutral tone, according to mediapost.com, indicating that the film achieved press pickup outside specialist health communications channels. The Clapboard Score of 71 out of 100 reflects strong craft execution and multi-award validation, moderated by the absence of verified downstream impact metrics.
The Snowball is a three-minute animated film created by FCB Health New York for SAFE Project, released in the United States in January 2025. It uses a growing snowball as a visual metaphor for how alcohol misuse escalates during winter months, leading to cirrhosis and other life-threatening conditions, and directs audiences to TheSnowball.org for resources.
FCB Health New York, an IPG Health company, created The Snowball for SAFE Project. Animation studio LOBO produced the film, with creative direction and direction by Mateus de Paula Santos, alongside co-directors Tiago Marcondes and Diogo Kalil, and production led by head of production Marcelo Barbosa, according to lbbonline.com and clios.com.
The Snowball won two Clio Health Silver awards, a Bronze Pencil at The One Show, a D&AD Pencil in Existing Music, and two ADC Merit Honors in 2025, according to clios.com, oneclub.org, and dandad.org respectively. The awards recognise the film's animation craft, art direction, and use of Billie Holiday's music as a creative device.
The Snowball uses Billie Holiday's Everything I Have Is Yours as its soundtrack because of Holiday's own publicly documented battle with substance abuse. The choice, which earned a D&AD Pencil in Existing Music according to dandad.org, connects the song's emotional weight to the film's subject, creating resonance without requiring spoken narration.
SAFE Project and FCB Health New York launched The Snowball in January 2025 to coincide with Dry January, reframing the cultural moment. Rather than celebrating a pause in drinking, the campaign targets people in the United States for whom winter alcohol misuse has already escalated into dependency or health crisis, directing them to immediate support resources.
SAFE Project is a United States public health organisation founded in 2017 by Admiral James and Mary Winnefeld, according to safeproject.us, following the opioid-overdose death of their son Jonathan. The Snowball expands SAFE Project's work from opioid prevention into alcohol misuse awareness, building on its January 2024 campaign It Ain't Five O'Clock Somewhere, according to adsoftheworld.com.
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