The brief from Volkswagen was to launch their two new small SUVs, the T-Roc and T-Cross, in market in Australia, create a buzz around them, and eventually have people test-drive and purchase the vehicle. Unfortunately, 2020 had a plan of its own, and only weeks after the small SUV launch, the COVID pandemic had shuttered Volkswagen's dealerships nationwide, meaning people couldn’t check out these new small cars, nor could they test drive or buy them. We needed to create fame around the launch of these cars while also inventing a completely new way for people to experience and purchase them.

The idea was to create the World's Smallest Dealership, an exact miniature replica of a Volkswagen dealership and a completely new kind of brand activation. The idea was that, thanks to its AR integration and online purchase ability, we could tour this dealership around public spaces where people could interact, explore, and virtually kick the tires of the new small SUVs, without impact of COVID restrictions. The idea was that we'd also generate PR in doing so, making our small SUVs famous in market.

Our strategy was to convince Australians to revaluate the way they could ‘try on’ and shop for a car. To take this to media, we enlisted a third-party retail expert and commissioned research to examine willingness to buy a car online since COVID. The findings validated our approach. 26% more inclined to buy online during COVID. 34% open to buying without test drive. 65% wanted to use technology to see products in their own home. The media strategy highlighted these findings, and how Volkswagen was the lead player in this new sector. We knew a strong visual device to symbolise this change in consumer behaviour would drive further media cut-through and ‘space on the page’. So, we toured the dealership around iconic Sydney locations capturing assets to symbolise buying from anywhere as well as providing a visual hook for publicity.

We created a completely new kind of brand event, an exact miniature replica of a Volkswagen dealership, down to the smallest detail. To further the experience, we developed a custom Augmented Reality experience that could be accessed by scanning the dealership, meaning people could ‘try on’ these new cars anywhere. Negating the need to actually visit a dealership in person and test-drive. We toured this entirely new kind of pop-up store around some of Australia’s most iconic landmarks like Bondi Beach and the Harbour bridge. Those who visited could shop to purchase these two small SUVs from right there on their phones. The campaign ran for a period of four weeks, however the AR experience and online purchasing was adopted by the business and is currently still running.

Our little dealership was a big success, leading to Volkswagen utilising it across their range, and it being benchmarked by Volkswagen globally. The campaign generated a large spike in traffic to Volkswagen’s website and thousands of interactions with the AR technology. It also sold cars. 460 of them in fact, totalling more than $36 million for Volkswagen. It also got people experiencing a test drive in new ways with 8,056 T-Roc AR interactions, 7,757 T-Cross AR interactions and 20,632 unique page views. We got people talking about a brand-new way to ‘try on’ and buy a car with 210 pieces of earned media coverage in Australia and internationally with 130m+ potential reach. 98% of coverage mentioned the AR and ‘trying on’ a Volkswagen. 50% included a link to the activation and 86% included spokesperson quotes and at least three key messages.