THISABLES

Silver eurobest Award

Case Film

Presentation Image

TitleTHISABLES
BrandIKEA
Product/ServiceDEMOCRATIZING HOME-FURNITURE FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES WITH 3D PRINTED ADD-ON
Category C01. Corporate Image & Communication
Entrant McCANN Tel Aviv, ISRAEL
Idea Creation McCANN Tel Aviv, ISRAEL
Media Placement McCANN Tel Aviv, ISRAEL
PR McCANN Tel Aviv, ISRAEL
Production McCANN Tel Aviv, ISRAEL
Credits
Name Company Position
Sigal Abudy McCann TLV VP Creative
Eldad Weinberger McCann TLV CCO
Nadav Pressman McCann TLV CCO
Adrian Botan McCann Europe VP Creative
Eldar Yusupov McCann TLV Copywriter
Dana Moshkowitz McCann TLV Art Director
Kfir Peretz McCann TLV Art Director
Eddie Goldenberg McCann TLV Creative Technology
Idan Kravitz McCann TLV Copywriter
Yiftach Sarig McCann TLV Copywriter
Michal Popov McCann TLV VP Clients
Bat El Assyag McCann TLV Account Supervisor
Sapir Zagury-Geva McCann TLV Account Manager
Neva Zerah McCann TLV VP Production
Emmanuelle Raz McCann TLV Producer
Meital Zeevi McCann TLV Digital Producer
Keren Goldenzweig McCann TLV Strategic Planner
Catalin Dobre McCann Bucharest VP Creative
Carmen Bistrian McCann Europe CEM
Sanjiv Mistry McCann London ECD
Jamie Mietz ECD McCann London
Catalin Paduretu McCann Bucharest Art Director
Jeremy Reichman McCann London Producer
Corina Nica McCann Bucharest Corporate PR Executive
Yuval Wagner Access Israel founder
Michal Rimon Access Israel CEO
Nachman plotinzky Milbat NGO general manger
Yael shaked bregman Milbat NGO Deputy general manager
Mariana ben david Milbat NGO Industrial designer
Tomer Fadael Milbat NGO Industrial designer

Background

A tenth of the world’s population suffers from disabilities. That is 1 in 10 people who not only fight to live normally outside, but struggle with the most basic home activities. Things that we take for granted -they battle with: turning on the light, getting up from the couch. So if IKEA’s mission is “creating a better life for the many”, we knew we had to do better. Our new mission: take peoples disability into consideration - and change their reality for the better. The reality they currently faced was furniture that was as ugly as it was expensive. An added cost, on top of already expensive healthcare. The mission was: to bridge the gap between IKEA’s products and people with disabilities in order to create a significant improvement in their ability to enjoy IKEA’s products - making sure that our consumers disabilities will no longer stand in their way.

Describe the creative idea (40% of vote)

After realizing that people with disabilities aren’t able to use IKEA’s items just like everyone else - we decided it’s time to hack our own furniture. Introducing ThisAbles: IKEA’s first step to make its most popular items accessible in every home - no health disability to stand in their way. How did we do it? We developed 13 add-ons to our most essential products, offering them free to download and 3D print on our designated website alongside a full web-series of video-tutorials. Each add-on was designed to solve a different accessibility issue: turn a small button into a giant one or lift a couch a couple of inches from the ground to help make getting up a little easier. Additionally, for those who wished to feel and experience these add-ons physically, we constructed the first-ever accessible space in IKEA stores - making the new products easy to try out.

Describe the final product (40% of vote)

Bringing ThisAbles to life was a long and complex journey – yet rewarding journey. We partnered with the leading non-profit organizations in Israel who specialize in improving the life of the disabled. We spent hours upon hours with our main target audience - people with disabilities - experiencing the world from their perspective. Then, together, we arranged a one-week hackathon, hosting product engineers, accessibility experts, psychologists, and IKEA designers - all focused on inventing the right add-ons, ones that could truly simplify the use of our products. It started in Israel - but grew to answer health needs around the world. To make sure our products were heard-of and available everywhere, we created the ultimate exhibition no one could miss. Online we presented our project through a designated website while physical we created a space to showcase our products - allowing consumers to see and try.

List the results (20% of vote)

Allowing a whole new audience to enjoy our products equally - had a big impact on our business: the sales of our 13 iconic items grew up by 33%, shortly after the project was launched. More than 45,000 people from 127 countries visited our website ThisAbles.com, thousands of them downloading and 3D printing our add-ons. ThisAbles drove one of the biggest organic international coverage in the history of Israeli brands, with PR value of $4M and reach of 489M unique users! Our story made waves in the biggest media platforms around the world including publications like the Washington Post, Fast Company, The Verge, Independent. The project did great service for our partners as well: +1500% in no. of visits to the websites of the non-profit accessibility organizations we partnered with. The bottom line: ThisAbles campaign disabled disabilities at home.