The Brief

At the core of our campaign was the insight that seeing and holding real shredded money creates a powerful visceral reaction in everyone – they immediately think about wasted money, and how to avoid its loss. Experiencing this first hand was key to delivering the most powerful impact, so the best way to bring it to life was via Direct. By getting shredded cash directly into the hands of New Zealanders, we were able to highlight the money they were wasting in paying unnecessary interest on their home loan, and create an emotional reaction that would shock them out of their complacency, and drive change. We sent a simple DM piece, containing $1,000 in real shredded cash, to home loan customers. It delivered a powerful message about how they could save thousands of dollars on their home loan by tailoring it with BNZ.

Creative Execution

BNZ’s mission is to help New Zealanders be good with money. It’s inherent in everything the bank does. The time was right to tackle the home loans issue, and help New Zealanders be better with the interest repayments on their biggest investment. Key to the campaign was getting real shredded money into people’s hands so they could consider the reality of how much they could be wasting by paying unnecessary interest on their home loans, and to kickstart a conversation with BNZ staff. Dimensional mail packs containing $1000 in real shredded New Zealand bank notes were sent to home loan customers to generate enquiry via the call centre and instore. Instore, and via activation, the campaign continued, with shredded cash on display in BNZ stores around New Zealand, provoking home loan conversations with bank staff - and national headlines.

Describe the creative solution to the brief/objective.

Our key target was affluent New Zealanders in the market for a home loan, especially in Auckland, one of the hottest property markets in the world. We needed to attract new customers and punch above our weight against much bigger budgets in a highly competitive home loans market dominated by lowest-rate offers and giveaway incentives. People had no idea that how they paid off their loan could be costing them – or saving them – thousands in real hard cash. With its unique tailored repayments that could help save $156,000 on a typical $300,000 home loan, BNZ could change the conversation.

Results

Home loan enquiries increased by 13%. With people asking for help to “shred my home loan”, bank staff described the campaign as “one of the best conversation starters we’ve ever seen.” Based on monthly rolling data, preference measures for BNZ increased by 11%. Home lending increased by $600 million. The campaign was credited by BNZ CEO Anthony Healy as contributing to a lending turnaround for the bank. Among non-BNZ customers, 30% more of them associated BNZ with ‘be good with money’ further building BNZ’s ongoing platform around their aim of helping New Zealanders be good with money. And New Zealand homeowners are saving real money, thanks to a simple campaign that recycled worthless shredded cash.