SOLIDARITY · COMMUNICATION AND FUNDRAISING · 2025–2026
SOS Satele Copiilor România
It’s not just a text. It’s their childhood.
One text message can contribute to the things a child needs every day: food, school, care and the security of staying with their family. For SOS Children’s Villages Romania, we created the concept of a campaign that makes this connection easy to grasp.
“It’s not just a text” puts the child’s needs at the centre of the invitation to give, and shows how a gesture made on a phone can become steady support.
The official campaign visual. Credit: SOS Children’s Villages Romania.Click to enlarge.
THE IDEA
How you make a message count
We get texts with passwords, confirmations and offers. We read them in a hurry and move on. That is where the creative challenge started: how do you give attention back to a message through which someone can help?
We tied the donation to a child’s everyday life. A bed to sleep in peacefully. Clothes fit for winter. A place to do homework. A family that gets support when things are hard. The campaign message brings those needs close to whoever can contribute.
THE VISUAL DIRECTION
The child in the middle of the picture
The visual shows a child looking straight at us, in the middle of adults absorbed in their phones. We all wear the same white T-shirt, we all look down. Their gaze stops us for a moment.
The message completes itself in three steps, like speech bubbles: “It’s not just a text / It’s his future / and his hope”. The invitation to give appears in the same frame, as the last bubble in the series, so that the action we ask for is part of the same sentence rather than a note added at the end.
WHAT WE BROUGHT TO THE PROJECT
The creative concept, developed for the SOS cause
Susțin
We developed the creative concept: the central idea, the message linking the text message to childhood, and the visual direction. The campaign was communicated publicly by SOS in the autumn of 2025.
SOS Satele Copiilor România
The organisation the campaign was created for. It manages the donations and the support programmes for children and families.
WHY STEADY SUPPORT MATTERS
A monthly donation helps keep support continuous. Preventing a child’s separation from their parents means working with the family over time, from basic needs and school to counselling and guidance for parents.
THE TWO POSTERS
A boy. A girl. The same message.
The concept was rendered in two visual keys, so anyone can recognise themselves in the child at the centre of the picture. The only difference is the last word of the headline, “his hope” and “her hope”.
The “and his hope” version.The “and her hope” version.
The campaign posters, as communicated by SOS Children’s Villages Romania. Click to enlarge.
Announced for 1 November 2025 – 1 March 2026, the campaign aimed to raise funds and draw attention to the risk of children being separated from their families. At launch, SOS presented the cause of the 1,500 children in its programmes.
In November 2025, SOS announced that the campaign materials would run through ProTV, Antena TV Group, Magic FM, Itsy Bitsy, Radio România Actualități, the Territorial Studios Department and Radio România Antena Satelor.
On 17 December 2025, Alexandru Dobre took over the SOS phone and answered the public’s messages in the activation “The hour that counts”. FC Rapid presented his participation as part of the campaign “It’s not just a text. It’s their childhood”.
THEY CARRIED THE MESSAGE FURTHER
The campaign partners, 2025–2026
The official partner board published by SOS Children’s Villages Romania, shown in full. Click to enlarge. The exact roles are those communicated by SOS; Susțin contributed the creative concept, not the negotiation of media partnerships or the production of the ad.
The campaign in the press
The launch was covered by AGERPRES, Magic FM and Gala Societății Civile. These appearances document the message and the roll-out of the communication.
You can donate directly to SOS Children’s Villages Romania. The official campaign page explains the monthly donation by text, the alternatives available and how to stop the donation.
A donation of 5 euro per month. The donation repeats monthly.
To stop it, textMAMA STOPto 8835.
The details and conditions are on the SOS page. Donations are not collected through this site.
Do you have a cause that needs a campaign?
At Susțin, we work with organisations that want to explain a need better and give people a clear way to get involved. We start from the cause, find the idea and build the communication around the action we ask of the audience.
