Overview
The Story of Stuff: Creating One of the World's First Viral Videos
Environmental activist Annie Leonard knew that, as a society, we have a problem with stuff: we make too much of it, throw it away too soon, and don't care deeply enough about what it is doing to our planet, our politics, and our health. By 2007, she'd developed decades of research and undercover work into a compelling story about our toxic relationship to stuff, and how we can change it for the better. Annie hired Free Range to present that story in a way that was informative, entertaining, and highly sharable—and we were very happy to help.
Working closely with Annie, we distilled her original hour-long talk on the subject down to a punchy, unforgettable twenty-minute adventure through the shocking realities of twenty-first-century consumerism. We then combined Annie's powerful narration with simple, compelling animation to illustrate the impact of unchecked consumption on our world.
Since its initial release, the "Story of Stuff" video has been viewed more than 40 million times. It has become a mainstay in school classrooms, economics courses, and even corporate sustainability trainings. What's more, it has served as a launch pad for The Story of Stuff Project, which continues to make films advancing Annie Leonard's sustainability work to this day.
