Hoax ad campaign drives point home to boy racers

As any boy racer will tell you, a 2004 Subaru Impreza WRX going for just $8,000 is a bargain,especially as the performance car of choice for late-night illegal burns through West Auckland streets.

However, advertisements for such a car that drew phone calls from almost 1,000 boy racers over thepast fortnight have given them something they weren’t expecting – a voicemail message from ‘Jake’ –a hysterical, crying ‘owner’ who had tragically killed a child by racing the car too fast. (Call 09 280 3098to listen to the message.)

To bring the car’s sale to the attention of the boy racing community, ads were posted on a range ofonline trading sites, in several newspapers and on the streets of Waitakere. The car itself cruised thespeeding hot spots donned with “For Sale” stickers and the seller’s phone number.

The campaign was the brainchild of Ogilvy ad agency’s creatives, Matt Williams and Freddie Coltart,who developed it on behalf of Waitakere City Council as part of an awareness initiative to curb streetracing.“We didn’t want to make an ad as such. We wanted to make an impact directly on boy racers byconfronting them, in a real situation, with what could become very real consequences for driving cars such as these irresponsibly,” says Mr. Williams;

“In a way it’s kind of a social experiment which wedon’t think has ever been done before to address an issue like this, and the results are surprising.”Out of the 300 messages left on the phone number’s voice message bank to date, Mr Williams saysaround three quarters didn’t leave a message but just hung up after hearing ‘Jake’s’ voice recording.

“We hope the underlying message got through to these listeners, many of whom would probably beinvolved in street racing. A certain kind of person buys a car like Jake’s. If it at least gets them thinkingabout what the effect of their driving could be, not only on their own lives, but also others in thecommunity, we’ve made a difference.”The new Deputy Mayor-elect of Auckland, Penny Hulse, who is an enthusiastic supporter of thecampaign, says more needs to be done at a grass roots level to address the issue of speeding.“When the Ogilvy creatives came to me with this idea I was immediately engaged. It was clever and wejust knew it would get a safe driving message out there to those who need to hear it most,” she says.

“It was certainly an unusual approach, but the high number of phone calls show it was a well targetedcampaign. Hundreds of young men will have heard the distraught message, and hopefully that willcarry through to them thinking about driving safer and slower,” says Ms Hulse.

Mr Williams says he was surprised that about 20 percent of the callers were still keen to buy the carafter hearing ‘Jake’s’ distraught message, and didn’t seem to be fazed by it.

“We had a few comments from callers who expressed concern about the tragedy but still wanted tobuy the car in spite of the pain it had caused by being driven dangerously. Some didn’t seemconcerned in the slightest, but just wanted to get their hands on a fast car. I think that shows thatthere’s still plenty of work to do to get the safer-driving message through.”

Mr John Finch, director of the Right Track programme – a unique 42-hour course that teaches youngpeople about the consequences of dangerous driving – says the ‘Car for sale’ campaign takes a much-needed fresh approach to addressing the issue of dangerous driving by youth offenders.

“We know that the TV ads don’t make an impact on the driving habits of youth. They just zone out.What we need to do is effect an attitudinal change that will transform behaviour from the inside out. It’swhat we set out to do with Right Track, finding a new way to communicate the message.”

Mr Finch says the Right Track programme – originally founded in South Auckland in 2007 – has sinceseen over 1,000 people complete the course, with police reporting that 83 percent of offenders whohave participated have not re-offended.

“There are still a lot of people in the Waitakere area with a ‘wild west’ mentality, whose activities – forwhatever reason – combine speeding, drinking and antisocial driving. More than anything, they neededucating. The ad campaign will have made an impact on some of these young people already, whichwe hope will get them thinking about their actions on the road.”