The average car buyer has up to 900 digital and physical touch points before purchasing a car. We also know that you need consistency to build trust. So, to raise awareness around an issue as complex as global gender equality, we created assets for as many touch points as possible. Combining online with offline, we made sure that every touch point connected with audiences and created an engaging and emotional experience. All in local languages across more than 70 markets, so consumers everywhere could clearly understand the idea and share the message.

Women are more likely to be injured in a car crash. The reason? Most crash tests are based on male crash test dummies. And even when a female dummy is used, it is often simply a scaled-down male dummy.

However, Volvo has gathered real-world data since the 1970s to learn what happens during a collision — regardless of size, gender, or body shape. For the 60th anniversary of the safety belt, we wanted to do more than celebrate history. We wanted to share this knowledge with the rest of the car industry, to make all cars safer for women.

Volvo’s philosophy has always been to put safety of people before business. 60 years ago, they gave away their three-point safety belt patent. So, we thought: what if we could get Volvo to make cars safer for everyone, once again?

And that’s exactly what we did. To make cars safer for women, we collected all of Volvo’s safety research and made it available to everyone. By creating a digital library with data from more than 43,000 collisions and 72,000 people, the research became open and free to any company to learn from.

For the first time ever, anyone could download more than 40 years of research and learn how it has led to some of Volvo’s most innovative systems. We then gave the numbers a face and showed how the injustice personally affects women in a global campaign with film, print, social, outdoor, and PR.

We found that women are 71% more likely to be injured and 17% more likely to die in a car crash. The reason: most crash tests are based on male crash test dummies. But Volvo has gathered real-world data since the 1970s to protect all people equally.

Therefore, our goal was to get Volvo to share this crucial data with the car industry to make all cars safer — regardless of brand, just like Volvo did 60 years ago when giving away the three-point safety belt patent. But rather than celebrating the anniversary, we saw greater opportunity in raising the equality issue and closing the gender crash gap.

The challenge was to catch the attention of regular consumers around a complex subject. To make people aware of the car safety inequality to finally prove Volvo’s permission to make this statement. To engage people all around the globe, we decided to show how the injustice affects women in a personal and direct way. We did this by spreading our message in a global campaign that included film, print, social, outdoor, and PR.

Every campaign element directed people to the website where anyone could download the research and learn how it has led to Volvo’s most innovative systems. We aimed to reinterpret as many different touch points as possible to make the data emotional and relatable for everyone. For example: the film worked as a introduction and tool for people to spread awareness, and the print ad invited the audience to literally put their hand on the issue.

The campaign quickly became news and sparked a global conversation about equal road safety. So far, the film has garnered over 85 millon views and has reached over 70 countries. It has appeared in over 450 articles and has been featured on newscasts and blogs all around the globe. With over 280 million social media impressions, we got the world talking about an issue many people were unaware of.

It also created a debate within the auto industry as other carmakers embraced the initiative, such as electric vehicle startup Uniti. But most importantly, more than 11,000 people have downloaded the data, which gives hope that EVA will improve the safety of women in all cars.

• Countries reached: +71

• Downloads from knowledge library: +11.000

• Film views: +85 million

• +450 news outlets

• Earned media reach: +317 million

• Social media reach: +90 million

• Engagement: +3 million

• Social media impressions: +280 million