THE POCKET DEALERSHIP

Short List
TitleTHE POCKET DEALERSHIP
BrandCITROEN
Product/ServiceCITROEN
Category G03. Single-market Campaign
Entrant BETC Paris, FRANCE
Idea Creation BETC Paris, FRANCE
Idea Creation 2 TRACTION Paris, FRANCE
Production SOLDATS FILMS Paris, FRANCE
Production 2 BETC DIGITAL Paris, FRANCE
Production 3 START-REC Paris, FRANCE
Credits
Name Company Position
Stéphane Xiberras BETC ECD
Nicolas Lautier BETC Creative Director
Stephan Schwarz BETC Copywriter
Jacques Decazes BETC Art Director
Moritz Maus BETC Art Director
Caroline Petrucelli BETC Creative Producer
Philippe Martin Davies BETC Strategic Planning
Jules Renault NA Director
Pierre Cazenave Soldats.tv Line Producer
Charlotte Giral Soldats.tv Production Manager
Alice Resseguier BETC Assistant art director
Arthur Pelissier BETC Art Director

Why is this work relevant for Direct?

AMI is an electric car: no need for a driver’s license, available from 14 years up for 6000€. A car to liberate the city. Paris has 3 Citroen dealerships for 2.2M inhabitants. Quite a challenge to test drive AMI. We put a car key into every Parisian’s phone, using the most popular car sharing app in Paris. Launching AMI through this app and replacing all the cars on it with AMIs, created hundreds of dealerships and test drives, without asking people to change their habits.

Background

Citroen is not your typical car manufacturer. Cars like the DS or the 2CV are part of automotive history. While most electric cars are expensive and incredibly complex, Ami is the opposite: Cheap and simple. A 2 seater, with a clever symmetrical design at its core. the best part? you don’t need a driver’s licence. A perfect vehicle for the city. And there lies the issue. Like most large cities, Paris has a very small amount of dealerships. And those dealerships were small anyway. So Parisians had to visit the suburbs to try out a car for the city. A real catch 22. How could Parisians test drive this car?

Describe the creative idea (30% of vote)

The idea is to put a car key into every Parisian’s pocket. And what does every Parisian have? A mobile phone. A mobile phone with plenty of apps, and in this list, Free2move, the largest car sharing app in Paris, with 600 000 users. By replacing all the cars from the apps with Ami’s, we were certain that Parisians would try out our car and discover all its USP’s, without a single salesperson needed.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

If you look at Ami, you know that this car is made for urbanites. Small, electric and cheap, it’s the ideal city car. Our audience are young people who don’t dream of fancy cars, don’t dream of luxury saloons but simply need a small practical car. This demographic uses apps for everything, so letting them try out Ami in their favourite car sharing app was vital. They didn’t have to download something new but simply use a tool they already had.

Describe the execution (20% of vote)

In the summer of 2020, Citroen replaced hundreds of cars from the car sharing app with their little Ami. An unfamiliar sight in the streets of Paris, they immediately attracted attention. People could rent them for 10 minutes or a full day and experience what Ami was about. Electric, small, practical and fun to drive. And to further widen the audience, we had a few influencers use Ami and tell their audience all about the car.

List the results (30% of vote)

Within 2 months, Ami clocked in almost 200 000 test drives resulting in the quadruple of sales (vs prevision)

Please tell us how the work was designed / adapted for a single country / region / market.

AMI is an electric car: no need for a driver’s license, available from 14 years up for 6000€. A car to liberate the city. But Paris has only 3 small Citroen dealerships for 2.2M inhabitants. And those dealerships were So Parisians have to go to the suburbs to try a car for the city. A real catch 22. The only way to have Parisians test drive this car was by putting a car key into every Parisian’s phone, using the most popular car sharing app in Paris.