YUBARI City Campaign no money but love

http://disruption.splinder.com/post/20909743/Yubari%2C+no+money+but+love
With a debt of $353 million, Yubari City in Hokkaido, Japan, went bankrupt in 2007. Our mission was to promote Yubari, reenergize its citizens, and help make the city economically viable once more.
We focused on the fact that Yubari boasted the lowest divorce rate in the whole of Japan and created the idea, "Yubari, no money but love". In expanding this idea we created a loveable, yet slightly ironic character called "Yubari Fusai" - Fusai means both debt and married couple in Japanese. We then collaborated with the City to create additional schemes that positioned the city as a destination for happy couples official certificates of happily married couples, branded merchandise and Yubari music CDs, to name but a few.

$1.5 million was generated in advertising value with exposure including 100 newspaper mentions, 100 online media mentions, 30 TV mentions and 53,100 blog entries (source: Google search). -Since the initiation of this project, annual number of visitors to Yubari increased 10% year on year, whilst $31 million has been generated toward alleviating the city's debt. - Branded Yubari Fusai products that initially were only available in Yubari now enjoy popularity nationwide.

Agency: Beacon Communications

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• yubari
• japan
• marketing
• promotion
• advertising
• campaign
• cannes lions