Compact cars are huge these days. With rising gas proces, urban lifestyles and the need for an easier way to find parking, many car companies have decided to invest their time and energy into developing smaller vehicles. I guess it all started with the Mini, then the Beetle, then the Mini again, and now we’ve got Fiat, Kia and a multitude of others. When you think of compact cars, everyone has their preference, but unless you’re a huge car enthusiast, it’s difficult to find obvious distinctions between models.

Volkswagon knows this, and considering they’ve been producing small cars (the Beetle) for a very long time, you’d think they know a bit about the subject. Recently, VW announced the release of their latest small car, the Up. It’s not as round as the Beetle, but it’s still small in size and is in definite competition with the other compact cars out there. So how does VW expect the Up to stand apart from the rest?

By giving buyers in the UK a map of tiny roads where the Up can go that most cars can’t. The map is small in size itself and comes inside the glove box of any new Up. Inside there is a list of a few roads around the UK where the Up would be perfect to drive. They are narrow, low and winding roads that let drivers experience exactly why they purchased such a small and maneuverable car. The map book is also a thing of beauty as all of its photography was professionally shot and accompanied by the GPS coordinates of each road. So if you’re out in the UK and you’re thinking of purchasing an Up, you’ll also be getting a map to enjoy it.

Pop up ads are becoming quite popular these days. Out here in North America we’ve been seeing them quite a bit, especially to announce a launch of a new store or restaurant. The idea behind pop up ads is to quickly grab people’s attention, then disappear in order to peak interest. It works extremely well when there is a lot of buzz surrounding the pop up, especially when crowds form. But in Japan, they’ve taken it all one step further, as you might expect.

Japanese pop band Perfume was set to release their latest single Spring of Life to the public, but instead of simply putting it on the radio, they hit Twitter. By announcing the release of the song to their thousands of fans, Perfume was able to generate enough buzz to justify their next move. They announced that their new single wasn’t going to premier online (like most tracks), but instead premier in real life in locations where people could experience it. The next move was where the brilliance came in. Perfume launched kiosks around Japan and announced their locations on Twitter. The kiosks were actually pop up ads that would only last a certain amount of time. Perfume fans were then encouraged to seek out these pop up ads, and literally plug in.

Each pop up ad contained about 40 headphone jacks that allowed anyong to simply plug in their earbuds or headphones and start listening to the song for free. The technology isn’t anything new, but the way the release of the song coincided with a Twitter campaign and eventually ended with the pop up ads, was sheer brilliance.

When your product has been documented as having 94.8% saturation or brand recognition you’d think that would be considered a success. A lot of money had been put into to making the product noticeable and to have such a high percentage is usually considered a good thing. But not in the case of UK dessert company Jaffa Cakes. Jaffa Cakes are known for their use of oranges and providing a fruity, sweet taste. And since being introduced back in the 1920’s there have been many people who have experienced them. So many in fact that Jaffa Cakes has apparently been enjoyed by 94.8% of the the UK.

So what about the remaining 5.2%? It was Jaffa Cakes’ goal to hit the hundred mark so they set up an amazing stunt to be played out by British comedian Donal Coonan. Coonan dawned what looks to be a Willy Wonka costume and hit the streets. He approached strangers and random people walking by him and started asking them if they were aware of Jaffa Cakes. In most cases they were, mostly because the brand has been around for so long, but in the off chance he stumbled upon someone who hadn’t experienced a Jaffa Cake, he made sure to tell them all about it. There still isn’t any news yet as to whether Jaffa Cakes has hit their hundred mark, but with the enthusiasm of Coonan behind the wheel, it’s really only a matter of time.

Over the course of a year, the entire world uses billions of plastic bottles. There’s detergent, hair products, and food containers just to name a few. So when a detergent company decides to promote their new biodegradable packaging, there’s always the opportunity to reinforce the fact that most of these containers can be recycled. For detergent company Skip, that’s exactly what they did. Skip was suffering a little bit from their competitors touting the strength and power of their detergents, so instead of getting into a comparison war, Skip decided to go a different way, brand themselves as the detergent with the recyclable bottle.

But instead of simply announcing their positioning like many other companies tend to do, they went out and pulled off a detergent bottle stunt. Skip hired artists from the Jupiter Drawing Room to try and come up with a cool new installation piece that would catch people’s attention. And it worked. As you can see from the images below, Skip’s bottle installation art piece garnered a lot of attention and PR, and not just for the brand, but for artists looking to use recyclable materials to create. It’s a double win for Skip.

Out in the Netherlands, Domino’s pizza delivery boys (and girls) were having a problem. Their delivery scooters were so quiet that they were having trouble letting pedestrians, bikers and cars know that they were there. It’s kind of a strange problem because in this day and age we’re trying to make things quieter, but I understand how a delivery person on a scooter could find it quite dangerous. The solution was a brilliant idea that combines safety, innovation and promotion.

Seeing as they didn’t simply want to make the engine louder, Domino’s saw this as an opportunity to self promote with a fake engine noise. But instead of recording a real engine noise (because that would completely defeat the purpose), they used people making engine noises with their mouths. Remember when you were a kid playing with toys cars and you would make engine noises? It’s exactly like that. And when the scooter stops at a stop sign or light, the idling engine noise is actually a man saying “Domino’s”. It’s called The Safe Sound and it’s fun, smart and quite hilarious.

Remember Pong? It’s kind of like the very first video game you could take home. There have been many iterations since it’s first inception, but the rules and the concept of the game have never changed. You basically control a paddle to direct a ball past your opponent’s paddle. Well BBDO in Germany looked at this game as far beyond two little paddles on a TV screen. For their SmartCar client, they decided to utilize this simple concept to show the benefits and features of the latest model. The result was a fun filled day full of people watching, driving and winning at ping pong.

The intention was to showcase the quick acceleration and reverse capabilities of the SmartCar. Not only is the vehicle itself compact, but it’s maneuverability is so diverse that it could control a paddle on the screen. So that’s exactly what they did. By controlling one of the SmartCars within a certain area, drivers were able to play a game of Pong by driving a SmartCar powered paddle.

Famous musician Jack White has had his share of publicity throughout his career, but when he released his latest album earlier this month, he made quite a splash in the advertising world. White and his recording company Third Man Records decided to release his new solo album with high hopes, like really high hopes. With that being said, Third Man attached copies of White’s new album to a series of blue balloons, and simply let them go into the sky.

The message makes sense, release it to the world and hopefully the sky is the limit, but there are some issues with a campaign like this. First, it’s difficult to know where they are going to land. I’m sure Jack White won’t be happy is 75 albums end up in the middle of the ocean. The fact that they were using balloons is also an environmental concern.  Releasing balloons into the atmosphere is a hot topic in green conversations because opf the damage the rubber can cause when it finally lands somewhere.

I’m not saying this is a bad idea or anything, but there could have been more thought put into the execution.

Ambient interactive advertising is difficult to pull off successfully. Not only do you need to have an amazing idea, but this idea needs to be simple enough that everyone can figure it out. Couple that with a strong message and great execution, and creating a great publicity stunt is one of the hardest things to do in advertising. But for television network TNT, they’ve done it. The TNT Push To Add Drama ambient execution is absolutely wonderful. It’s simple, extremely well executed and the message is clear.

It’s really the simplicity of the concept that makes this so successful. Simply put a button in the middle of the street and ask people to press it. It’s almost unavoidable because anyone and everyone who walks by needs to press it. Then, without warning, the drama around them comes to life. The message is also bang on because all they are trying to say is that flipping to their channel will being a lot more to a viewers entertainment experience.

War Child is a well-known non-profit organization dedicated to bringing the awareness of child soldiers throughout the 1st world. Not only does their marketing plan shock people, they tend to get people thinking quite a bit, and in the end, that’s really all you can ask. Until now. In the wake of the Kony 2012 initiative, War Child has created their own stunt, but on a much smaller scale (as opposed to the global effects).

War Child created a life-sized military tank… out of balloons. The intention was to bring the topic of child soldiers to the forefront by asking passerbyers to Tweet a special message. The message was to “Take the war out of the children.” The tank took thousands of balloons to create and for each Tweet, they would release one balloon into the air. Environmental issues notwithstanding, the goal was to have the tank completely dismantled by Tweets.

So do you think this was a success? Did War Child achieve their goal of bringing the topc of child soldiers to the forefront? Or did they just add to an overall environmental issue? Your call.

Okay this might be borderline ridiculous, but has anyone actually thought that order pizza was a hassle? Whether you have the local pizza joint on speed dial or you’ve come into the digital age and you order online, getting a steaming, fresh pie delivered straight to your door is almost too simple. Well, if you live in Dubai, and who doesn’t these days, it just got even easier. In an effort to simplify even the chore of calling in to order a pizza from Dubai based pizza chain Red Tomato Pizza, they’ve created the one-touch order fridge magnet called the VIP Fridge Magnet.

The concept is quite simple, basically you go online initially and you set your favourite order. It could be the deluxe pepperoni with cheese, the veggie, whatever you normally order. Then you set your address, your phone number and you’re all set. Then, the next time you’re feeling peckish, simply walk over to the fridge and press a single button. Within the hour your pizza order will arrive, no hassle required (other than having to pay of course).

You can look at this two ways. The first is obvious, we’re a lazy bunch aren’t we? And this will revolutionize the pizza ordering experience until the end of time. The other way you can look at this is in terms of technical progress. Who out there ever thought you’d ever be able to order pizza by pressing a fridge magnet? It doesn’t matter what you think about the idea, Red Tomato Pizza in Dubai just want you to push that button.