News of a potential pitch was reported in January and handled by the AAR. The BHF never retains an agency, but prefers to call a pitch for each advertising brief, a practice for which it has come under fire from the ad industry.
The charity receives the largest amount of funding into heart disease research in the UK and provides life-saving cardiac equipment and patient care.
Betty McBride, director of policy and communications at the BHF, said: "We had the most amazing level of creativity during the pitches and a great range of ideas. We tested the concepts with our target audience and the ideas from Farm were universally liked. We've asked the agency to start work on this immediately in the run-up to our April campaign launch."
The charity's last outing, "doubt kills", showed a man's chest being restricted by an invisible belt to depict a heart attack. It was created by TBWA\London.
The charity is known for running hard-hitting campaigns. In September, it created a poster campaign created by The Design Group, showing a young girl drinking from a bottle of cooking oil with the tagline "what goes into crisps goes into you". In addition, a BHF microsite had been set up showing children what "gross" stuff goes into them and included gossip on celebrities and games.
In 2004, it ran one of its most hard-hitting and controversial ad campaigns featuring a cigarette dripping with fat, which triggered complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority in February 2004. The anti-smoking ad, created by Euro RSCG London, included scenes where an artery is squeezed, exuding a fatty substance, and fat dripping from the ends of smokers' cigarettes.
The ads, which recorded 90% recall among smokers, drove record traffic to the BHF website but a total of 64 viewers complained that the ads were distasteful and unnecessarily graphic. The ASA did not uphold the complaints.