Breaking The Brand To Stop the Demand for Rhino Horn in Viet Nam.

Brands can be both built and broken. The Breaking The Brand project www.breakingthebrand.org is using research from behavioural economics, cultural anthropology and social psychology to target the users of rhino horn. We are focusing on the demand and the customer because despite all the incredible work going into the conservation, anti-poaching and legislation side, the poaching rate keeps increasing.

Africa’s and Asia’s rhinos are being wiped out for a useless detox drink and a needless business gift. Escalating demand from a small number of Vietnamese businessmen, who are the primary group, is driving the current rhino killing spree.

Poaching rates have continued to grow and 2015 saw another record year for rhino poaching. 

The nature of this demand is new; in the main it is not based on use in traditional medicine or myths such as the aphrodisiac properties of the horn. Instead, the demand is driven primarily by a relatively small number of (newly) wealthy, status conscious males who use rhino horn mixed with water or wine as a supposed detoxifying drink (called the millionaires detox drink) during drinking sessions with colleagues and clients. The people engaged in this practice are not necessarily concerned about the potion’s efficacy. Rather, they are motivated by the perceived status they gain from being part of a very small and exclusive circle who can afford to consume genuine rhino horn. They also give rhino horn as gifts as they negotiate business deals and buy favours.

From interviews with this user group, and the other primary user group, wealthy women (in many cases the wives of these businessmen), Breaking The Brand found only two factors that would motivate them to stop using rhino horn before it is too late for the rhino:

1. A potential negative impact on their personal health/wellbeing through using rhino horn

2. A perceived negative impact on their personal status

Our aim is to destroy the current brand of rhino horn in Viet Nam as a 'status enhancing' product. The main uses for rhino horn are as a:

Status symbol in building business networks and negotiating business deals

Detox drink for high-status men after a night of indulgence.

Health supplement for the children and aged parents of affluent Vietnamese women.

Your donation will be used to fund the production of new campaign images. We have used the same images in all 3 previous campaigns 

and now need to produce new powerful visuals to maintain the attention of the primary users of rhino horn.

All adverts have been and will continue to be produced with the creative (and pro-bono) support of Nigel Dawson and Randal Glennon, Co-Directors of Three Wise Men (http://www.three-wise-men.com.au/what-weve-done/pr...

Whilst Randal and Nigel work pro-bono, the photographer and his team cannot have offered Breaking The Brand 'mates rates' to shoot and do the post-production work on the images. The models have donated their time, the location has been donated. We need 4 new images for our future campaigns and we have been given a quote of around $4,000 at 'mates rates'.