It looks like something out of a science-fiction movie, but it's real.
This is an actual 20 story car tower that takes up just 20% of the space of a conventional parking garage handling the same number of vehicles. Volkswagen uses the facility in a showy delivery process for its new car customers. Volkswagen's Autotürme, or car towers, are distinguishing features of the Autostadt. The transparent cylindrical buildings rise 150 feet above the grounds, and they're linked by a fully automated delivery system to both the Volkswagen factory and theKundenCenter (where VW customers pick up their new cars).
"In a fully automated procedure, your new car is brought down to you from one of the 20-story Car Towers. Large signboards in the Customer Center show you when your turn has come. Then, you're handed the keys, your picture is taken, the glass doors open and your brand-new car appears. You're all set to go."
Who said stairways can't be fun, or bins can't be intriguing..? Not Volkswagen that's for sure. In a latest campaign themed around the 'Fun Theory', VW has taken a step forward for not just a car manufacturer, but for any kind of brand in any kind of business. The core of their campaign is the notion of 'fun', and when walking up and down the stairs becomes fun, then you know your doing well.
Thefuntheory.com is dedicated to all things fun coming from the overall campaign:
'This site is dedicated to the thought that something as simple as fun is the easiest way to change people’s behaviour for the better. Be it for yourself, for the environment, or something entirely different, the only thing that matters is that it’s change for the better.'
The first of these 'ideas' is the 'Piano Staircase'. The piano installation was created to encourage people to make the healthier choice to take the stairs as appose to using an escalator. And the results in usage of the staircase verses the escalator clearly show that fun works.
The next video depicting 'The World's Deepest Bin,' an outdoor public bin that makes a cartoonish sound of something falling very very far, had the effect of getting park-goers and passers-by to not only throw away their own rubbish, but also to clean up the rest of the park just to hear the falling sound again.
This is great ingenuity and 'thinking outside the box' (that sounds like such a prehistoric term, any-who), to truly interact with the public on a mass scale. VW has looked beyond their reach to engage with a variety of audiences in a way that is simple, humorous, clever, unique and most importantly fun. Undoubtedly, with the use of the variety of channels and mediums available for us to share and distribute information and content, this is a campaign that will have 'wings' and spread both offline and online, in a truly viral manner.
Next, they're working on an arcade style recycle bank. And who said Volkswagen were boring...
..and the changing of behaviours has already begun it seems...
