Kids lose interest when learning serious topics like road safety and quickly forget what they were taught. But they do learn faster, without realizing it, while playing.

Doodle Mats, created by Renault, are the first play rugs for kids that feature real-life streets and pedestrian crossings from around their homes, mapped from Google Maps and Google Street View. Together with parents, children play and learn traffic safety, on replicas of roads they walk every day.

On our website, parents input their home address and a custom-made algorithm converts Google Maps and Street View data into illustrations that recreate the surroundings of their home: buildings, streets, pedestrian crossings and much more. They are printed on a carpet and delivered.

Each design is a unique combination of illustrations, generated from personalized geolocation data. The innovative products leverage mapping technology to create fun educational tools that keep kids safe in the city.

With the Doodle Mats, Renault launched a unique medium, so an entirely new platform had to be put in place. A website was created where parents could quickly customize the carpets to their address, select a style and place the order.

The personalized carpet designs were generated automatically, using a custom-built algorithm that connected with Google APIs. As carpets were rolling out of the factory, delivery services brought them to the customers’ doorstep. The whole process was quick and easy.

The Doodle Mats were launched in the spring of 2018, supported by a digitally-led advertising campaign (call-to-actions on social media, display advertising, PR). Smart targeting and the innovative product assured that people responded quickly, without Renault having to put up a large media investment.

As word spread about the Doodle Mats, parents went to our website and mapped a total of 378 km2 of city area, to apply for their customized play rugs. The orders exceeded expectations for the launch promo by over 300%.

Press and influencers picked up the idea and promoted it on their pages, praising the brand for getting involved in pedestrian safety in a surprising and innovative way.

Thanks to the success of the launch promo, Renault plans to offer Doodle Mats as a permanent product, to support their road safety efforts.

This way, the brand helped in educating kids about traffic safety, so they will become a more responsible generation of pedestrians and drivers.

Car-maker Renault created Doodle Mats, the play-rugs for kids that feature real-life streets and pedestrian crossings, from around their home. By repurposing digital location tools, like Google Maps and Street View, Renault created a new small-scale medium that address the issue of road safety education for kids.

Parents went online, inputted their address and a special algorithm produced an illustrated visualization of the surroundings of their home, complete with buildings, roads and pedestrian crossings. It was then printed on a carpet and delivered to their homes. This way, Doodle Mats transformed the play-rugs of children’s rooms into personalized learning media.

Our targeted audience were families with children, living in urban areas of Romania (where most accidents involving pedestrians happen). To drive traffic to our “Doodle Mats” website, we used an online campaign that targeted parents on social media (Facebook especially), websites (parenting sites, toy e-stores, etc.) and by recruiting relevant influencers to spread the word about the idea.

On the Doodle Mats page, precise geolocation data was extracted from Google Maps, thanks to a custom-made algorithm that connected the Google API with our website, translating mapping data into colorful illustrations.

This new educational medium brought together parents and children, to teach the littlest pedestrians to be safe on the streets of their city.

Romania has the highest rate of pedestrian casualties in the European Union, accounting for a third of the total number of road fatalities in the country. Most of them (69%) take place in urban areas.

For car maker Renault, safety is a top priority – not just for drivers and passengers, but for pedestrians as well. Renault cars regularly score 5 stars in Euro NCAP tests, with 8 models in the current range getting best-in-class ratings. The company decided to help reduce the number of accidents for the most vulnerable category of pedestrians: children.

According to a report from the European Commission’s Department of Mobility and Transport, most accidents involving kids happen around their home. Many children cross the street on unmarked areas, outside pedestrian crossings or signs, putting themselves at great risk. Attempts at road safety education have done little to resolve this issue.