After Why don’t you come over, Romanians adopt Remanians

Cristina Blanaru Ads, Creativity

After the Brexit vote in the UK, Romanian publication Gandul.info, GMP Advertising and Webstyler launched a campaign that saw couple thousand British citizens turning into Romanians in a matter of hours. Online and as part of a campaign showing solidarity with Europe, Romanians adopt Remanians campaign was born.

Initiated by GMP Advertising and Webstyler for Gândul, the main purpose of the campaign is a symbolic support for Europe as all know it today. Creating a strong bond between the Romanians and the Brit who will react in social media would likely influence the agenda of some politicians who are promoting xenophobia, intolerance and discrimination towards imigrants.

Whu don’t you come over?, the campaign we launched together with Gandul in 2013 would’ve been extremely suited now also. The website whydontyoucomeover.gandul.info is still active. But we decided to propose, this time, a more playful campaign, that would go viral fast and allow as many new friendships as possible between Romanians and Brits, randomly on Facebook. I am convinced that the referendum’s vote would’ve been different if more Brits would have effectively known more Romanians and not just read about them in DailyMail and other tabloids with an anti-immigration agenda

Mihai Gongu,

Executive Creative Director GMP Advertising & campaign’s coordinator

Romanians Adopt Remainians is a platform connecting Romanians and British that didn’t meet previously and offers a virtual Romanian ID to the Remanians, namely the British that support the European project.

We initially thought that maybe the British wouldn’t join the game, that they would have a barrier in letting themselves adopted by us, Romanians. The results at 48 hours showed us that they understood the symbol, the sense of the idea. We believe people can change history, that is why we created the premises of a real dialogue between people, because this is the only way to stop being manipulated by media and politicians. This dialog can take place in social media, free, uncensored, as each feels. For me, it is a joy to see that a campaign which brings forward a positive concept, of togetherness, unite, acceptance, became viral in the international press, competing with the negative news of major impact in Europe

Bogdan Nitu,

General Manager Webstyler

In just 3 days, campaign’s website already had 12,000 citizenship requests, over 3,000 IDs requested by British citizens and over 3,000 Romanian voluteers ready to adopt Remainians. The international press (like CNN, Campaign Magazine, The Guardian, Huffington Post, NZHerald.co.nz, Newseek, SWR3 ) relayed campaign’s initiative.

UK’s ambassador in Romania had a positive reaction to the campaign also:

…the campaign is about generating Facebook connections between Romanians and British and anything generating friendship between the people in our countries is for sure welcomed

Paul Brummer

The team that worked on the campaign includes:

  • Mihai Gongu – Executive Creative Director, GMP
  • Bogdan Nitu  – GM & Head of Digital Strategy, Webstyler
  • Andrei Balan – Head of Communication Strategy, Webstyler
  • Carmen Marinescu – Project Director, Webstyler
  • Sasha Tanase – Art Director, Webstyler
  • Dan Neciu – Web Developer, Webstyler
  • Cosmin Panait – Web Programmer, Webstyler
  • Razvan Stanga – Web Programmer, Webstyler
  • Andreea Lazar – QA Tester, Webstyler
  • Stefan Georgescu – Strategic Planner, Webstyler
  • Ionut Raicu – Graphic Designer, Webstyler
  • Andreea Cristea – Copywriter, Webstyler
  • Elena Ciric – Social Media Manager