The Campaign

Meet Graham, the only person designed to survive on our roads. Part interactive sculpture, part educational tool and ultimately a catalyst for conversation, Graham shows us how humans would need to change to survive a car crash. Over several months a trauma surgeon and a road safety engineer collaborated with a world-renowned artist using decades of road safety data, medical research and creativity to deliver evolution underpinned by evidence. Their goal was to create a visceral experience with a simple, unavoidable message. If you don’t look like Graham then you need to slow down on our roads. During the process key weaknesses in the human body were identified and modified, each change told a new story, showing what happens to our bodies in common crash scenarios.

Creative Execution

In July 2016, Graham was launched at the State Library of Victoria in Melbourne. People were introduced Graham via digital and real world experiences, including online film, social content and PR. Film, outdoor and social drove people to the interactive exhibition, which toured regional areas where people are 4 times more likely to be involved in a crash. Visitors could use Tango, Google’s new augmented reality technology, to go beneath his skin and better understand his anatomy. For a wider audience that couldn’t meet Graham in person, social and online comms encouraged people to visit www.meetgraham.com.au. The site replicated the in-person experience, providing visitors with the interactive tools to explore him in 360 degrees, both internally and externally. As Graham was adopted into school curriculums, the site also served as a portal for educators to obtain lesson ideas in subjects spanning science, arts and civics.

To date 287,282 people have visited Graham in the flesh, with an 86% increase in gallery visitation and 1 in 6 people in regional areas having seen the exhibition. Beyond the exhibit, Graham sparked a global road safety conversation. With over 10 million website visits in 5 days, 1.2 billion views in the first week and 89% campaign message recall. Graham has been adopted by the W.H.O. as the global face of road safety for 2017. An indication of Grahams cultural impact comes from Google. Search online for ‘Graham’ and the entire first page of web results, and first 15 images, are all of the ‘Meet Graham’ campaign, achieved organically through user action ($0 on SEO). But the most important influence Graham has is on our future drivers, as he was integrated into the school curriculum and to date over 2000 educational resources have been downloaded from the meetgraham.com.au website.

Meet Graham is a simple yet broad reaching health awareness campaign, executed across multiple media channels, creating rich, unique and more immersive experiences along the way.

Vulnerability isn’t necessarily a simple message. Beyond creating a better understanding of our own mortality, we needed to deliver complex information around subjects like kinetic energy and impact force. To do that we had to create a powerful ‘hook’ which then gave users avenues to learn more. While Graham is a visceral experience with a simple, unavoidable message - If you don’t look like Graham then you need to slow down on our roads - the real learning opportunity comes when you delve deeper into why he looks the way he does. We wanted to create a campaign that immediately educated everyone who saw Graham as to the core, main message but also encouraged to delve further and fully understand the reasons behind each of his physiological changes.