Surfing is synonymous with Australians.

But we’re far from giving women a “Fair Go” when it comes to competitive surfing.

1 in 3 Aussie surfers are women but only 10% of junior competitors are female.

(AusSport, 2022; LiveHeats, 2021).

The full potential of female surfers is being capped at grassroots levels because there is no clear pathway to the top.

As a brand standing for "Progress for Humanity" and major sponsors of the nation’s largest grassroot surfing events, Australian Boardriders Battle (ABB), it was time for Hyundai to level the playing field.

BRIEF:

Electrify grassroots women’s surfing by bringing innovation to the future of the sport.

OBJECTIVES:

Connecting Hyundai Brand to aspirational coastal audiences.

>Brand consideration

>Brand salience (trust/innovation)

Authentically adding value to the surfing community through engagement

>Earned coverage quality

>Surfing community engagement

Driving progress by increasing participation of female surfers in sport

>Participation Rate

>New athletes discovered

SHE’S ELECTRIC:

Unearthing the future of women’s surf on performance - not looks.

We connected live competition data from Australia’s largest junior surfing events into the first women’s national ranking, giving every athlete a profile based on real-time performance-data. The bigger their score in the waves, the bigger their exposure in the media.

HOW IT WORKED:

The best way to identify up-and-coming athletes is breakout performances.

ABB is scored as a team, women were anonymous numbers grouped with men. No national ranking existed for grassroots women.

For the first time, we pulled female scores around Australia into one leaderboard.

LiveHeats™ data measured power, flow and speed, creating an Average Wave Score linked to each unique rider profile.

From anonymous to athletes, every woman could be discovered regardless of team or location. Top 5 made the sponsorship “Team Electric”.

Never in surfing history has a mixed-event separated scores to spotlight women.

1 in 4 Aussies are surf fanatics.

Whilst dominated by men, women’s surfing is Australia’s fastest growing sport (AustralianSportsCommission, 2022) and equal prize money mandated in the World Surf League.

However, women remain underrepresented at every level:

EXPOSURE:

Represent 10% of sports & surf broadcast (Nielsen, 2021).

PARTICIPATION:

Half the spots of men on the World Tour, a ratio consistent with all pro-events, <25% at grassroots.

Leveraging Australia’s largest surfing-competitor dataset, LiveHeats™, we discovered women represented just 10.2% of grassroots Boardriders Clubs, even Bondi has 6:96 women:men.

VANITY METRICS:

Sexualised and objectified by media and sponsorships.

Don’t have the looks? Don’t have the profile.

STRATEGY: From Performative > Performance

Demonstrate Hyundai progressing the world of women’s surfing by removing subjectivity, enabling athletes to be judged on performance in the water...and nothing else.

To fight sexism in this sport, we didn’t just use our voices, we used data.

1. Established She’s Electric

Engaged Australia’s 750+ Boardriders Clubs, partnering with Surfing Australia.

Women competed in local competitions. Bigger their score, the higher they climbed.

2. Supercharged Athletes’ Profiles

Every data-point became a national profile.

As the leaderboard updated, live performance-data informed all media touchpoints, promoting whoever was moving up the national ranks across social, video, PR and outdoor.

We partnered with female surf publication “MurMur-Mag” to produce the official ‘She’s Electric Post Show’ with junior-pros Tru and Jesse Starling. Film and editorial analysed data and leaderboard movements, including commentary from global surf industry greats.

3. Champion Team Electric

Top 5 made “Team Electric” provided financial sponsorship, intensive conditioning at the Olympic High-Performance-Centre, media training and PR - even making the commentary booth on national TV.

Today, they’re the face of She’s Electric 2.0.

From news desks, to newspapers. Women’s surfing made the national agenda on performance, and nothing less.

AUTHENTICALLY CONNECTING OUR AUDIENCE TO THE HYUNDAI'S VISION OF 'PROGRESS FOR HUMANITY':

7.5M reached (1/3 Australians).

Brand consideration +131% YoY amongst surfing population. +15% compared to primary competitor Mazda (6% on base).

Female surfing population felt represented by the brand, “A brand for people like me” +14%, doubling YoY.

Brand trust increased 8%>43% YoY.

Perception as “innovative brand” rose +86% YoY.

AUTHENTICALLY ADDED VALUE TO THE SURFING COMMUNITY THROUGH ENGAGEMENT:

SURF COMMUNITY:

20,000 event spectators.

+7,500 hours live-streamed throughout season (Surfing Australia, 2023).

AMPLIFIED TO THE MASSES:

Broadcast female athletes across Australia’s top television networks, Seven and Nine.

Profiled in national mastheads, including the Daily Telegraph, Body & Soul and West Australian.

That's $1.9M earned media exposure.

DROVE PROGRESS BY INCREASING PARTICIPATION OF FEMALE SURFERS IN THE SPORT:

75 unknown athletes unearthed.

100% participation of Australia’s 750 Boardriders clubs.

+6% increase in female participation from 10.2% > 16.2% (LiveHeats, 2023).