Death Trap

Background

New Zealander’s believe that house fires are ‘rare’, and will not happen to ‘them’.

The majority claim to have working smoke alarms but, in fact, many aren’t working – due to flat batteries or having been disabled.

Those who do concede a fire is possible believe they will have ample time to get out, or they will be rescued.

In truth, 93% of all fire fatalities occur in homes without working smoke alarms.

The intention of the campaign was to make property owners aware of the dire consequences of not having a working fire alarm.

Idea

From previous campaigns, the NZ Fire Service knew that hard-hitting consequence-based messaging was more likely to change behaviour.

They wanted to focus on the possibility of death and the proposition that “smoke alarms save lives”. On a production and media budget of 40K.

So, the agency created ‘spoof’ real-estate signs that were installed outside kiwi homes across the North Island of New Zealand.

The signs were customised to each property. ‘3 Bedroom Death Trap’, for instance.

Ads also appeared in the property section of the online site, TradeMe and local press.

Results

The campaign generated significant ‘talk’ about fire safety, a subject not frequently under great scrutiny. The signs even made the front page of Auckland’s ‘The Herald’ newspaper with an article titled, ‘Death in the neighbourhood’.

Anecdotal evidence was that it inspired many people to safeguard their homes.

Cars slowed down, people stopped to take photos of signs, signs were stolen, and notes were left in letter-boxes thanking the relevant homeowner for sharing such a critical safety message.

NZ Fire Service staff displayed these signs outside their own homes and appreciated being part of a campaign designed to prevent tragedy rather than having to deal with the sad aftermath of it.

Our Thoughts

Creativity, Piyush Pandey, now Chairman of Ogilvy India, once said, was the art of doing the most possible with the least amount of money. This campaign, then, has creativity written all over it.

The trick, as it has always been, is to get your message talked about and the way you do that is by setting out deliberately to do something different. It requires nerve as well as nouse. It’s impossible to measure how many lives have been saved but even if it is just one, this campaign has been worth every penny of the €20,000 it cost.