2010 Winners & Shortlists

The Campaign

Volvo was celebrating the 50 year anniversary of their 3-point seatbelt. Despite countless seatbelt awareness campaigns, seatbelt usage is low in Dubai – the UAE has one of the highest rates of road deaths the world. Our challenge was how to get young people to begin thinking positively about seatbelts rather than collectively avoiding them. So to engage with fashion conscious youth, we found a unique way to talk about safety – by looking at the ever-changing fashions worn underneath the seatbelt. And while most seatbelt safety campaigns focus their efforts on costly print or tv campaigns, we leveraged a limited budget (USD 32,000) by identifying cost-effective channels that would surprise and connect with young people directly.

Success of the Campaign

This unconventional approach took our message where few safety campaigns have gone before. Thousands saw the mall activity over the five week campaign – with onlookers taking photos and posting their shots across blogs and social media. The magazine created PR in places Volvo safety normally would never get in: such as fashion blogs and style magazines. Plus, the tactical component generated genuine leads and test drives. All in all, we produced more than 6,800 media impressions, over US$ 55,000 worth of free media coverage, countless test drives and more than 1,800 real leads for Volvo. And most important, young people started looking at the seatbelt differently.

Describe how the campaign/entry was launched and executed across each channel in the order of implementation.

We created an image collection featuring popular trends from the past – all worn with the seatbelt. But rather than depending on ads in magazines, we reduced costs and increased understanding by creating our own fashion magazine, connecting youth with seatbelt interest stories and fashion in one attractive package. Magazines were distributed directly to cafés, galleries, and the press. The mall, frequented by young people, was identified as a space to target them during their shopping journey, where and when they least expected it. So we partnered with popular retailer Massimo Dutti, creating high-impact storefronts featuring seatbelt clad mannequins. These garnered attention, driving people instore with a direct promo – the chance to win a new Volvo. As the campaign gained momentum, live mannequin displays amplified the buzz – drawing impressive crowds. Instore, postcards drove people to enter the contest online, where we captured valuable data with every entry.