Solarplicity: Power To The People

In its mission to make renewable energy simple and affordable for all, Solarplicity is launching a campaign through Iris to give ‘Power To The People’ – and will be giving away 1m kWh to 100 homes that need it most this winter. Working with Community Energy England, it will identify 100 elderly individuals who will receive free energy through solar installations.

Solarplicity appointed iris in April 2017 with a brief to help ‘start a movement in addressing and ending fuel poverty’, and challenge the standard ‘Big Six’ energy approach to standard variable tariffs, which means often people are paying big bills when they haven’t used the energy. This is a growing issue in the UK, with one in 20 elderly households classified as ‘fuel poor’ – making them especially at risk in the winter.

Iris worked with creative and B2B agency Founded and digital acquisition specialist Atom 42, both recent acquisitions to the Iris network, to create the integrated content-led campaign that aims to create a memorable act that will establish the brand in the hearts and minds of customers.

Rather than adopting a more traditional ‘tugging on the heart strings’ approach, Iris wanted to create shareable, heart-warming and entertaining content that had a serious undertone. The three social films all feature a strong ‘nan’ character, campaigning for ‘likes and shares’ in order to spread awareness about fuel poverty.

The goal is to get people spreading the word about an important issue that needs to be addressed, and for every 100 likes and shares, Solarplicity will be giving away energy to an elderly household.