Farber Debt Solutions Explores Personal Toll of Debt in ‘Break up with Your Debt'

Debt can be a slow takeover. It often starts small, then quietly spreads into every corner of life. It affects sleep, time, and personal choices. It appears in the kitchen, the bedroom, and in relationships, until it begins to feel like a constant presence rather than a financial obligation. Farber Debt Solutions has illustrated that reality head on with 'Break Up With Your Debt', a bold campaign designed to jolt Canadians out of the toxic cycle of minimum payments and constant stress, and into action. The message is clear. 'You don’t have to stay here. There is a way out.'

Built on the insight that money is one of the longest relationships we’ll ever have, the campaign exposes what happens when that relationship turns controlling and unhealthy. Not through sterile numbers or soft reassurance, but through three dramatised scenes that feel instantly familiar. 

In one spot, a person sits at home overwhelmed by a mountain of laundry while a giant debt character lounges beside them, feet up, taking up space and offering nothing back. In another, someone lies awake in bed, exhausted, while debt steals the blankets and keeps them trapped in a restless night. In the third, a person tries to enjoy a simple dinner out, only for debt to reach across the table and take food off their plate, despite already having plenty. The campaign makes that invisible weight visible. And it makes the next step feel possible.

“Debt thrives on silence and shame. This campaign breaks both,” said Terry Yakimchick, VP marketing, Farber Debt Solutions. “It’s a wake up call for anyone who thinks minimum payments are the only option or that they’ve run out of options. You haven’t. There is a real, legal, structured way out, and we’re here to guide people through it.”

“In this category, people are used to being spoken to with solution based peace of mind messaging, which can feel generic,” said Matt Litzinger, co-founder and chief creative officer, The Local Collective. “Our insight was that debt behaves like a bad partner. It takes over your space, your peace, your choices, then convinces you it is just how life is now. That is why we didn’t dramatise debt as a spreadsheet problem. We dramatised it as a personal one. We put it beside you in the laundry, in bed, across the table. Because that is where people actually feel it. When you stop seeing debt as who you are and start seeing it as what is happening to you, change becomes possible.”

'Break Up With Your Debt' rolls out nationally across out of home, connected TV, OLV, social and radio. It meets Canadians at one of the hardest points of their lives, then offers a clear step forward.

The campaign was created by Farber’s AOR TLC, The Local Collective, and media bought by We Are Other.