Stretching safety

How can a historically safe car be reinvented as a safe and luxurious car? Volvo Car Australia’s Living Seawall campaign did just that, and for its efforts has captured a 2020 WARC Grand Prix Award for Effective Innovation.

The challenge for the brand, as outlined in this WPP version of the case study, is that Volvo is synonymous with safety and the brand was unable to market to premium buyers with a safety message. Safety isn’t a salient motivator for those consumers because they perceive that safety has become a commodity among cars. Even mass-market vehicles are considered quite safe.

Volvo, however, can’t walk away from safety because that is in its DNA.  So how to build that bridge?

A key insight was that luxury and status are no longer just about extravagance. Instead, they can be exemplified by thoughtfulness and intelligence.  Volvo used this insight to find a cultural opportunity.

In Australia, 85% of the population lives near the coast. However, development has eroded huge amounts of natural shoreline. Development along the shoreline has forced the construction of seawalls, which have eliminated many of the native mangrove trees, which in turn has permitted plastics (which used to be filtered by the mangroves) to pollute the shoreline, drift into the water, and kill wildlife.

Volvo developed a thoughtful and intelligent solution to this seemingly intractable problem, employing upcycled plastic to create what it calls a Living Seawall. The wall consists of tiles that mimic the root structure of the mangrove trees and essentially clean the water.

Installed near Sydney Opera House for maximum visibility, and supported by paid and earned media, the wall helped the brand achieve a 113% increase in luxury associations and also sparked a dramatic increase in consideration among luxury buyers. Oh, and sales jumped 38% in Australia.

This is a great example of how a brand can re-frame itself without losing itself, and also for how a brand can embed itself in a broader cultural story.