To garner attention for the message and give it cultural relevance, we chose to physically demonstrate what it was to “embrace change” using the incoming President as both inspiration and illustration.

A replica of the Oval Office in Union Station that showed thousands of commuters and visitors how IKEA would furnish the most important room in the world. At EmbraceChange09.com, Americans could design their own virtual Oval Office and send their submissions to the White House. And a motorcade brimming with IKEA purchases cruised through the city making many wonder if the president was actually embracing change.

The unique timing of the economy and the changing administration provided an ideal platform to present IKEA’s concept. With 222,304 unique site visitors and 3,998 designs submitted to the white house coupled with 400+ unique media placements, 60+ minutes of broadcast coverage and 500,000,000 impressions, “Embrace Change” gave IKEA its largest PR success in the brand’s history with the “embrace change” message becoming the definitive brand platform for now and hopefully for many years to come.