Let Go of Car Monogamy
Mr Wolf reframed car ownership as an unhealthy relationship for GoGet, launching a category-first platform, “Car Monogamy,” that gave Australia’s leading car share company a distinctive, ownable position as it took on an industry built on outdated assumptions.
The Situation
Cars have always been sold on the promise of freedom, but for most owners that promise doesn’t hold up. The average car spends 96% of its life parked, and even sitting idle, it drains your bank account through depreciation, loans, leases and maintenance – and that’s before factoring in the environmental cost. At the same time, attitudes towards ownership were shifting fast: in a world already comfortable with Netflix and Spotify, more people were waking up to the advantages of access over ownership, particularly younger Australians increasingly sceptical that car ownership represented the freedom older generations associated with it. GoGet had the model to capitalise on this shift, but needed a way to make the case.
The Strategy
Mr Wolf’s insight was that people’s relationship with their car mirrors an unhealthy relationship with a partner – an emotional over-investment that has owners pouring money into upkeep with little return, instead of enjoying the freedom a car is supposed to provide. We named this phenomenon ‘Car Monogamy’ – not simply owning one car, but the state of mind that keeps people irrationally, unhealthily wedded to it. That gave GoGet a genuine challenger position: rather than compete as a cheaper or more convenient alternative to ownership, GoGet could position itself as the healthy way out of a bad relationship.
The Creative
The idea played on the tropes of monogamy and relationships across every channel. In outdoor, the messaging was distilled to a pure challenge to car owners’ emotional over-investment. In digital and social, we juxtaposed comic depictions of Car Monogamy, elaborate car-selfies and date-night rituals, against the freedom that comes from letting go. Tactical promotions turned the metaphor into an offer, inviting people to ‘have a fling’ with a GoGet BMW soft-top for the weekend, while PR activity leaned into dating culture to bring the idea to life beyond paid media. The campaign launched nationally under the line ‘Free yourself from Car Monogamy,’
The Results
The campaign ran across two years contributing to:
- 48,000+ increase in actual members (pre-campaign vs current)
- 34% increase in memberships (pre-campaign vs current)
- 2.8 million additional trips – 58% increase (new & current members, pre-campaign vs current)
The Reaction
“We were looking for a campaign that encapsulated the behaviour-shifting attitude of our brand whilst challenging the status quo that you must own a vehicle to enjoy its benefits. ‘Car Monogamy’ neatly wraps all this up and provides us a platform from which we can continue to disrupt the category. People are now ‘growing up’ to GoGet instead of growing up to car ownership. We want as many people as possible to know that car share is working for many of their neighbours and can work for them.” Richard Tourino, Marketing Director, GoGet
Read more about GoGet at our News Section
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