The UK petrol retail market is intensely competitive. Purchasers are generally loyal to stations near by and few see any real brand differentiation.Our brief was to drive loyalty and increase customer value by building an emotional connection with drivers and so to acquire new members for Texaco’s loyalty scheme and to reduce post-promotion churn.We also sought to build on Texaco’s heritage as the petrol brand most concerned with road safety and to excite and engage primary school aged children whilst simultaneously educating them of the dangers of traffic and road safety.

Important road safety messages were brought to life through the Aardman-produced animated adventures of Hector, an imaginative 9-year-old boy. Five stories promote five road safety rules to a generation of young children.Art directionally the campaign uses a dark cartoon style to appeal to children who enjoy the frisson it gives. Copywriting uses Blyton-esque language to drive home the power of Hector’s overactive imagination. DVDs were freely distributed in Texaco stations and online. Hector also has an interactive website with games, the films themselves and tools to allow children to create their own Hector storyboards.

Although not primarily about driving incremental income, the campaign increased monthly income by an average of 12%. It also helped deliver 70,000 new members to the loyalty scheme. Registrations (an inverse measure of churn) increased by 20%.The digital work has also been a success. 20,000 unique visitors visited the site at www.hectorshome.com. Each visitor clicked through an average of 8.1 pages per visit. Over 5,000 visitors used the online storyboard maker and 20% of these created an entry for the competition we ran to win a trip to Aardman studios.