Samsung’s goal was to raise awareness of their eco-conscious products and technologies by demonstrating to a curious global consumer how they are helping society achieve a more sustainable future while minimizing the environmental impact of their products.

Yet, to effectively engage this curious global audience, we knew Samsung had to address a frustrating paradox that remains at the heart of green business: Brands too often communicate their sustainability initiatives and then call on individuals to take action on them. As a result it can often feel like brands are passing the climate responsibility onto consumers.

Therefore, our challenge was to get consumers to see how good intentions can translate to meaningingful actions by choosing Samsung. Put simply, our storytelling campaign needed to close the “intention-action gap” about sustainable technology.

Fortunately, the role of The New York Times is to help people understand the world, including how to live in it. And we have the global audience Samsung was trying to target. Our editorial coverage reflects our dedication to the environment and our belief that sustainability must be a top priority newsdesk. Everyday we invest in putting the complexity of climate change at the forefront of our readers’ minds and conversation. In fact in 2021, we published 5,146 stories with “climate” in the headline.

As one of the world’s foremost electronics companies, Samsung’s partnership with The New York Times enabled the brand to help people translate their sustainability beliefs and knowledge into everyday actions – at scale. Through dynamic storytelling with our content studio, T Brand, we illustrated how Samsung’s approach to sustainability is artful and adventurous and aimed at inspiring readers to embrace creative and sustainable solutions in their everyday habits.

Samsung came to T Brand particularly for our documentary film and storytelling expertise in order to demonstrate how they are helping society achieve a more sustainable future. But, with many brands communicating their sustainability initiatives, we knew our films couldn’t add to the noise and pass their climate responsibilities on to consumers. It was key that our content – and the actions we we’re asking consumers to take – didn’t add complexity to their lives but instead make life more seamless.

Therefore, our strategy was simple: empower individuals to live their values by showing them sustainable choices are seamless with Samsung.

To deliver on this strategy, we produced a 360 multi-media campaign, “Creating Sustainably”, demonstrating to readers how to make sustainable choices easier. We took a human approach to storytelling by creating three films amplified through short-form display units and full-page stories. Each content piece was inspired by various NYT journalism features, using our understanding of reader engagement, to tell stories in the most compelling format.

Launched on World Environment Day, our first film followed Max Lamb, a furniture designer, as he gives an often-forgotten material — like cardboard packaging — a second life as a household chair. Our second film illustrated how actions people make in their everyday lives, like doing laundry, are made seamlessly more sustainable with Samsung products. Our final film explored how Andrew Nichols, a Samsung Engineer, upcycles electronics for his community to foster a more circular economy.

The collective power of our campaign enabled Samsung to reach 49 million global readers across The New York Times platform. Our impact was felt in every corner of the Times, including showing over 440,000 readers in the newspaper how to repurpose cardboard boxes into practical items for their own homes.

And in the age of atomized attention spans, we didn’t just reach a massive global audience. It kept them engaged too, with over 14,000 people spending an average of over 2:30 with our films.

Beyond engagement, over 2,200 people immediately sought out more information around how Samsung is helping society achieve a more sustainable future and how they too can do their part.