In case of emergency: Eat this book.
The Arabian Desert is one of the most extreme environments known to man. There, even the most experienced driver can quickly succumb to the harshness of the desert.
To form a lasting connection between Land Rover and its target audience, we created a practical desert survival guide as a giveaway to all Land Rover owners. This guide not only gives you extreme tips to stay alive in the desert, but as a last resort, you can also eat it.
The survival guide is made out of edible paper and ink, its metal binding can be used as skewers, and its reflective packaging to signal for help.
We sent the book to 2,000 potential and existing customers in the UAE, gave it away as a supplement to the cars’ manual, and 3,000 copies were made freely available in sports shops.
The edible guide is made out of a specially made potato starch paper.
Printing was made possible using glycerine based ink.
Metal spiral binding can be used as cooking skewers.
Reflective packaging can be used to signal for help.
There are plenty of survival tips inside the guide. From finding water in the desert to knowing signs of exhaustion.
And if all else fails, you can always eat the book. At 372 calories, it's almost equivalent to a cheese burger.
Results
The response was very positive. The book rapidly disappeared from the shelves of sports shops and Land Rover showrooms were filled with requests for copies of this new adventure must-have. The book was featured in more than 100 blogs and magazines such as Gizmodo, Jalopnik, Huffington Post, PSFK, Fast Company, Creativity-Online, Creative Review, AD Week, Design Taxi, Business Insider, Auto Viva, Auto News World, Bushcraft USA and a whole YouTube episode produced by Rhett & Link. Even food magazines like Bon Appetit and Food Beast took notice. As a result it garnered over 82,000 shares and more than 62,000 views from one YouTube episode. Overall, the book earned over $250,000 of media impressions with zero media budget.
As a result, the number of test drives in the UAE increased by 37%. And the Land Rover showroom in Dubai became the Regional Top Sales Dealers for Land Rover with sales up 40% compared to 2011.
