The DNA Journey

Background

momondo was founded with the belief that everybody should be able to travel the world, meet other people and experience other cultures and religions.

The trouble is, we live in a divided world and often blind prejudice leads us to think there are more things separating us than unite us.

By opening minds, momondo hoped to open the world.

Idea

momondo launched a competition through Facebook and Twitter inviting people to share their DNA with the company. They were mailed a small tube and asked to spit into it.

This small sample was enough to be able to map out the individual's genetic ancestry going back as far as 2,000 years. In other words, the test revealed which geographical territories the person came from. Winners got to travel with momondo to all those places their ancestors had once lived.

Competitors were asked to shoot a short video of themselves reacting to the DNA results when they received them. Their emotional response would be the ticket to the finals and to winning the journey of a lifetime.

Some of the results turned out to be remarkable.

The French woman who believed she was 100% pure French, who discovered to her amazement she was more than 50% English.

The Englishman who announced he disliked the Germans, who found out he was partially German himself.

The man who learned "I am a Muslim Jew."

Even more amazing, in the final, when the last competitors came together, two discovered that they were related.

The intention was to force people to rethink their identities and discover that they have more in common with the world than they imagined.

Results

166,675 people entered the competition and 500 won DNA sample kits.

From them, fifty came together to be filmed in the final, when their genetic make-up was revealed and they learned where they were going to travel.

The video has had over 120 million views, most on Facebook but over 16 million on YouTube.

Within the first month of the video's launch there were over 7 million comments, likes and shares was viewed more than 23 million times on Facebook alone and 16 million times on YouTube.

Our Thoughts

I think this is brilliant. They say travel broadens the mind but, of course, it seldom does. In pitching values of openness and multiculturalism, momondo clearly differentiates itself from its many competitors. It's exactly the sort of positioning that will appeal to millennials.

For me it is the depth of the idea that is so compelling. The video is a joy to watch but behind it are the individual videos made by the contestants and on the website five tips to making the most of the world. Lower your guard. Do talk to strangers. Say yes! Stay curious. Care to share.

This is Hero, Hub and Help content woven together imaginatively and expertly