We organised a major power failure. Studio lights went off for a few seconds, there was a bang before smoke started coming out of Mircea Badea’s laptop. We destroyed the Toshiba laptop on live TV.

The incident sparked major coverage on blogs and via Twitter, clips were uploaded to video sharing sites and soon everyone was talking. Coverage crossed over to traditional media and the incident became a national event.After two days of media frenzy we returned to the show and made our No Matter What guarantee real. We gave Mircea Badea a new laptop, creating fame for Toshiba and credibility for the guarantee.

POS displays showing that even the most stupid accidents would be covered – a laptop damaged by nails, or dropped into a fish tank – were placed in crowded shopping places.PR drove further coverage with interviews featuring Toshiba executives in key publications.

The YouTube video attracted 30,000 views and images of the incident were viewed 20,000 times.

Bloggers wrote 28 articles about the incident and there were hundreds of comments, attracting a total audience of 4.3m.

The online buzz drove conventional media coverage delivering 4.8m readers via print and an additional 341,000 online readers.POS displays reached 1.5m in malls and shops.Toshiba laptop sales rose by 40%.