All over New Zealand, at any one time, “hundreds of people are speeding who don’t want to be,” says the New Zealand Transport Agency. And until now, they, passengers along for the ride, haven’t had much of a say in it. If they speak up or assert their right to choose their risk, they get shut down by the driver. So most of these ‘unwilling speeders’ stay silent, their reluctance to go that fast left invisible or ignored.
Clemenger BBDO and the NZ Transport Agency have launched a new campaign called “Your Speed is Shared,” to offer passengers a voice, and ask the drivers to reconsider their right to dictate speed for others.
The launch film features people sitting in cars being driven at speed, but without a visible driver. By removing the drivers from the vehicles altogether, the viewer is left faced solely with the discomfort their speed causes their passengers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qw4vltJk9c8&feature=youtu.be
“With our social norm of the driver having exclusive say on their speed, passengers who want to slow down feel unreasonable, unjustified and alone,” said Rachel Prince, principal advisor advertising at the NZ Transport Agency.
“But for every speeder, there’s potentially a passenger feeling extremely vulnerable.”
“This work raises two important questions,” said Brigid Alkema, ECD, Clemenger BBDO. “Does the driver’s right to determine their speed overrule the passenger’s right to feel safe? And can we create an environment where if passengers speak up, it actually works?”
“It was a privilege to make great actors genuinely uncomfortable with a speeding, invisible driver. Our crew did an amazing job pulling this off in-camera,” said Jae Morrison, director, FINCH.
The second job, of creating an environment where passengers speaking up has an effect, is brought to life through a series of four short supporting videos featuring the passengers themselves, discussing how they feel about being unwilling speeders.
“The idea here is to get speeding drivers to recognize the vulnerability their speed creates for their passengers.”
A series of billboards, also featuring the passengers and bearing the simple message ‘Slow me down’, brings home that is the driver who has control of the speed, but also the passenger who has to live with it.
