Subaru National Make a Dog's Day

Older and disabled shelter dogs, the animals Subaru calls Underdogs, are among the most overlooked in shelters, and Subaru needed its National Make A Dog's Day initiative to reach pet lovers beyond its own channels. Automotive brands rarely hold credible ground in animal welfare, so the campaign had to lean on Subaru's long-running, retailer-level pet program to avoid looking like borrowed purpose. Open Influence worked from a clear audience fact: more than 60% of Subaru owners are dog lovers, so credible pet creators with authentic adoption stories could carry the message better than brand channels alone.

Open Influence put the Underdogs themselves at the center of heartfelt, creator-led video, framed as part of a long-established movement rather than a one-off campaign. A curated roster of nine pet-focused creators on Instagram and TikTok, with followings from 87K to 8M including @thehuskymoon and @jennelle.eliana, produced adoption-themed content, culminating in a collaboration with actress and animal advocate Kaley Cuoco.

Building on the established Subaru Loves Pets program gave creators substance to point to rather than borrowed purpose, while casting real special-needs shelter dogs as the central characters kept the brand in a supporting role and made adoption feel concrete. The work ran on Instagram and TikTok. The award entry reports over 8.3 million views, more than 502K engagements, 8K shares and saves, and 3K clicks, all self-reported with no adoption or business outcomes disclosed. The recovered agency page shows no campaign-specific metric values, no campaign year is stated, and the Shorty Impact Awards entry corroborates the campaign but does not name the delivering agency, so attribution to Open Influence is self-reported.