This Bike has MS
MS Society
Issue 38 | March 2016
Agency
Grey Melbourne
Creative Team
Chief Creative Officer Michael Knox Art Director Joash Tham Copywriter Adam Grant
Production Team
Agency Producer Katie Wellbelove Director/DOP Max Walter Editor Chris Brown (Trace House) Digital Director Evan Karas Digital Executive Creative Director Junjek Low Digital Project Manager Nicolas Brosse PHP Developer Bala Suruliraj Operations Manager Wendy Ng Digital Art Director Sebastian Quek Finished Artist Amahl Weereratne
Other Credits
Bike Builders James Macleod Thom Pravda General Manager Claudia McInerney Planning Director Danish Chan Account Manager Aaron Rocca Regional Director, PR & Corporate Communications Huma Qureshi Regional Corporate Communications Executive Pang Yanrong MS Society MS Group Manager Marketing/Communications Jan Staunton
Date
December 2015
Background
MS Cycle was an annual event in Melbourne. It was a great opportunity for people to enjoy a day out with friends, exploring their own city while raising funds for support services to help sufferers.
Since 2007, 33,000 cyclists had raised $4m.
In 2015, the MS Society wanted some sort of media stunt that would raise both awareness and interest in the event.
Idea
"This is a terrible bike to ride".
These were the words the MS Society most wanted to hear in 2015 about the cycle they had designed and purpose-built.
The bike itself was given the debilitating and invisible symptoms of multiple sclerosis, hidden within its construction.
Led by Paralympian Gold Medallist Carol Cooke, who had been diagnosed with MS in 1998, a team of neurologists, physiotherapists, bike mechanics and people living with MS set out to make a bike that simulated the early symptoms of multiple sclerosis. The wheels were buckled, and made from heavy materials to add resistance, the cogs of the gears were given broken teeth so the chain would slip unpredictably, the frame was bent to unbalance the bike so it would sway randomly from side to side.
Media personalities and top cyclists were all invited to try riding the bike in the lead-up to the race itself. Their experiences were streamed live to help obtain maximum PR coverage.
Results
In the first 3 weeks of the campaign, with zero paid media support, it had achieved:
55,000 video views.
15,000 websites views.
8,200 social media likes.
5,100 social media shares.
Our Thoughts
I think it was Rei Inamoto, former creative panjandrum of AKQA, who said that advertising today is the business of creating experiences that are 'useful, usable or delightful'. I love the way our business creates rules and then breaks them immediately. Here is an idea that sets out to do the very opposite of useful, usable and delightful, a bike that's uncomfortable, exhausting and even dangerous. What fun the bike makers would have had doing it. And how brave/foolish someone is going to be in paying good money to ride it on March 6th at the MS Cycle event. What makes this particular analogy of what it's like to have MS so powerful is that hundreds of people will experience it for real and become more energetic in their support of the cause.