VW: Reduce Speed Dial
Volkswagen sought to encourage safer driving habits among parents, recognizing that while they engineered safe cars, influencing driver behavior was key. The brief was to find an innovative, emotional way to remind drivers to prioritize safety on the road.
Creative Idea
Children's artwork replaced speed dials, emotionally reminding parents to drive safely.
Volkswagen engineered safer drivers by allowing children to personalize car speedometers with their artwork and messages, creating an emotional, constant reminder for parents to drive safely and prioritize family well-being on the road.
The Speed Bump for the Heart
A shift from blood and guts
For decades, road safety advertising in New Zealand and Australia relied on "scare tactics" and graphic imagery to deter speeding. Colenso BBDO and Finch pivoted away from this "blood and guts" tradition, utilizing behavioral economics to create a "nudge" rather than a threat. Creative Chairman Nick Worthington noted that the industry often overlooks simple answers, arguing that while VW engineers safe cars, the driver remains the primary cause of crashes.
Hand-drawn limits at 100kmh
The production involved retrofitting four standard VW Golfs with custom speedometer panels. The children of the participants, including a young girl named Bianca, hand-wrote every digit from 0 to 240 km/h. A recurring "Easter egg" in the design was the 100 km/h mark; most children instinctively placed their most vibrant hearts and "I love you" messages at this legal limit, creating a natural psychological barrier. Director Luke Bouchier captured the experiment as a social study rather than a traditional commercial.
Telematics and the awards bait debate
The results were tracked via GPS and telematics, revealing that 75% of drivers cut their speeding incidence by 50%. One driver reduced their top speed by 19 km/h, while another recorded zero infringements during the trial. Despite the success, the campaign faced scrutiny from critics at *The Spinoff*, who labeled it "awards-bait" due to the small sample size of four families. However, public demand was so high that Volkswagen NZ briefly made the personalized dials available to the general public on request.
Creative Strategy Deconstructed
Company
Volkswagen credibly delivered by leveraging its engineering expertise to integrate personalized digital displays into vehicle dashboards.
Category
The category usually relies on fear tactics or statistics to promote road safety, often failing to create lasting emotional impact.
Customer
Parents deeply wanted to keep their children safe and appreciated a constant, emotional reminder of their family's love and well-being.
Culture
The cultural moment embraced personalized digital experiences and the power of emotional connections to influence daily behaviors.
Company
Volkswagen credibly delivered by leveraging its engineering expertise to integrate personalized digital displays into vehicle dashboards.
Category
The category usually relies on fear tactics or statistics to promote road safety, often failing to create lasting emotional impact.
Strategy:
Leverage deep emotional connections to transform abstract safety concerns into personal, ever-present motivators for behavior change.
Customer
Parents deeply wanted to keep their children safe and appreciated a constant, emotional reminder of their family's love and well-being.
Culture
The cultural moment embraced personalized digital experiences and the power of emotional connections to influence daily behaviors.
Strategy:
Leverage deep emotional connections to transform abstract safety concerns into personal, ever-present motivators for behavior change.
Results
Volkswagen New Zealand saw a 21% increase in their Road Safety rating in the first 12 months. Drivers reduced their average speed by 3.3%. Volkswagen reported a 5.7% sales increase in the first 12 months, marking their biggest sales growth in 10 years.
21%
increase in Road Safety rating
3.3%
average speed reduction
5.7%
sales increase
Strategy Technique
Find the Consumer Truth
The campaign tapped into the profound truth that parents' love for their children is a powerful motivator. It leveraged this emotional bond to encourage safer driving habits, making family safety a constant, personal priority.
Explore Technique
Creative Technique
Customize and personalize
The campaign directly involved children in creating unique artwork and messages for their parents' speedometers. This personalization transformed a functional car part into a powerful emotional reminder for safer driving.
Explore Technique
Craft Breakdown
The campaign's craft is exceptional in its technical innovation, seamlessly integrating a bespoke digital application with a car's existing systems to transform the speedometer into a personalized, emotional safety reminder.
The sophisticated engineering required to integrate a third-party application's dynamic visual output directly onto a car's essential speedometer display represents a significant technical achievement in vehicle systems modification.
The creation of the intuitive and child-friendly mobile application for artwork creation and seamless upload, alongside the effective digital rendering and UI design of these personalized visuals for the car's dashboard.
The profound impact of the campaign stems from the masterful fusion of user-friendly digital craft with advanced automotive technology, creating a deeply personal and effective safety intervention.
