Via lottery, we offered university clubs free use of a Toyota for one month. This gave thousands of students the chance to experience the freedom of owning a car. To spread the word, we simply created posters showing club members with their cars and placed them as outdoor advertising near universities, and strategically conducted PR with magazines. With little money and a great idea, we got the word out and let it spread virally. Sure enough, college bloggers picked up the story and the national media followed. Our website featured a running narrative of the campaign, serving as its nexus.

Clearly, students loved the experience of owning a car. We conducted and recorded interviews with students before and after having the car; 60% said their opinions of car ownership had changed for the positive. Thanks to extensive mass media coverage—partially instigated by our strategic placement of PR in magazines—the campaign attained a 40% recognition rating, which is phenomenal considering that our sole use of advertising media comprised of outdoor media at train stations near universities. Toyota, which had never before undertaken such experience-based communication, was sufficiently impressed to want to continue conducting this kind of campaign.