Victim Fashion

To warn teenagers to be more safe around railway tracks, we launched ‘Victim Fashion, created by accident’: a youth safety campaign disguised as a fashion label.

Relevancy - Art Direction and Social & Influencer

To be embraced by fashion influencers and especially our rather picky target audience, we needed to visually strike the right chord in every stage of the journey. That’s why a lot of effort was put in the simple but effective visual identity of the short- lived brand.

First, we put together a collection, developed after police reports in close cooperation with forensic experts.
Then came a tease phase. In unboxing video’s, influencers showed parts of the clothing, inviting followers to the fashion show. The show had to be visually stunning and convincing up until we revealed the true nature of it to the press, influencers and large teenage audience.
Online, the clothing had to be presented convincingly on both the Victim Fashion website and in the Instagram ‘store’. Before the reveal, visitors could only see beautifully pictured details of the damaged clothing (not giving anything away). After the show, each piece could be seen fully, together with the sad story of how it came to be.

Relevancy - Activation & Experience and Impact

Teenagers are hard to reach and even harder to impress. To get through to them, we chose for the biggest common denominator: fashion. We disguised a safety campaign as the next fashion label. Carefully selected influencers hyped the brand. Once we had everyone’s attention, the shocking truth was revealed to the young audience, press and fashion community.

The message and impact of the show itself soon spread far beyond the target audience.

Victim Fashion was debated around the world within days of the launch. Both on social and mainstream media.

All the important Dutch news programs featured Victim Fashion prime time more than once.

- > 1.2 billion media impressions

- Earned media (conservative estimated) worth: €14.5 M

- Headlines across 20+ countries.

- 74% of the entire Dutch teenage audience reached

- 745.000 via influencers

- RTV media: 6.070.000 viewers, 9.548.000 listeners

- Online & print: > 20 M

- Social: 7.7 M viewers

- Own channels: 620.000 views

- Paid online media: 1.053.162 views

Additional

Victim Fashion was also noticed by those who are emotionally involved with other railway accidents. Out of respect for them, ProRail decided not to run the campaign any longer than needed and took it offline.

To warn teenagers to be more safe around railway tracks, we launched ‘Victim Fashion, created by accident’: a youth safety campaign disguised as a fashion label.

The collection is based on the clothing victims wore when the fatal accident happened. This was only revealed during the launch fashion show.

Influencers, who were in on the project, hyped the ‘brand’, teasing the audience with close-ups of the clothing's ‘distressed look’ in unboxing video’s. Followers (including secondary influencers) were invited to the launch event at an Amsterdam Fashion show. Hundreds of teenagers and influencers attended. In front of cameras, the press and key influencers, the shocking truth behind the collection was revealed by an exceptional survivor.

The stories behind each item could subsequently be discovered in detail on the fashion label’s Instagram account and ‘web- store’.
The ‘collection’ was made in cooperation with forensic experts, based on police reports and clothing from actual accidents.

Despite previous campaigns, the number of railway fatalities in The Netherlands tripled since 2016. Most victims being teenagers. Often, the result of reckless behaviour around railway tracks. To halt this dramatic rise, Dutch governmental railway company ProRail had to get through to a young, hard to reach and even harder to impress audience. So impact was needed.

Jury Feedback

CRAFT – ART DIRECTION / BRONZE

Everyone reacted with a ‘wow’ on this entry. So, there was clearly amazement. Such a heavy subject, and still so beautifully art directed. This campaign reminded us to keep thinking big and bold. Show courage and keep fighting for ideas that can also get a lot of criticism (as was the case here). And hats off for the client who had the balls to approve this. The jury decided to award a Bronze Lamp because they were amazed.

ADVERTISING – SOCIAL & INFLUENCER / NOMINATION

Smart and innovative way to use influencers as part of and to benefit the campaign. It is clearly a very unique campaign with regard to the use of clothing used in a controversial way. Stylish way of presenting the clothes - this is something you see in the fashion world - executed very well. The jury felt it was very clever in the way that the influencers were being influenced and created real stories because of that. Really got them involved - struck by emotion. The project was awarded a nomination rather than an award for this category because there wasn't a lasting effect.

ADVERTISING – ACTIVATION & EXPERIENCE / NOMINATION

High impact idea that was executed with craft. The juxtaposition between harm of rail disaster vs. consumer interests in fashion made it a big eye opener. The jury awarded this a nomination because of the uniqueness of the idea and bravery to create a shock factor to wake up the audience.

NEXT - IMPACT / BRONZE

This project is bold, and the jury admires how ProRail was willing to take a risk by launching this campaign with the goal to create awareness amongst a specific target group. For many - including the judges - this campaign is a painful one to watch. We rather not see it, and that’s exactly why we should avoid this from happening (again). The choses execution (fashion show) was unexpected and we applaud the makers for the unpolished visual display of this issue that definitely deserves more attention/awareness. The jury would have loved to see taking the project even a bit further, making the campaign not only an awareness project, but also more of a memorial and involving victims/their families, making them ‘ambassadors’.