Audi
We helped Audi reclaim leadership it had once uniquely owned.
All-wheel drive had become the luxury market norm, turning quattro from an Audi advantage into an expected feature. Behavioral research unveiled that confidence is contextual. It’s shaped by weather, traffic and road conditions. So instead of selling functional protection from difficult roads, we made difficult roads feel ordinary. The Earth is Flat. With quattro. One idea simple enough to carry every vehicle quattro touches, and provocative enough to capture fleeting attention.
72%
increase in “Audi quattro” search volume
4.1
point lift in innovation, performance and safety
Opportunity
Make a technology everyone now has matter again.
quattro, born in motorsport, was the innovation that defined Audi engineering. Then all-wheel drive spread across the market, turning a defining advantage into an expected capability.
Competitors compounded it by telling the same story. All-wheel drive became safety, traction and control. But quattro has always been about more than that. It expands what a driver can do. How confidently you accelerate, corner, and push further. To reclaim quattro’s leadership position, we had to reclaim the possibility it creates.
Solution
Own the feeling, not the feature.
With quattro, challenging road conditions feel remarkably ordinary. That notion led to our platform: The earth is flat. Rather than showing what quattro does, we showed how it makes the world feel. The provocative statement captured attention with the brand’s unique confidence. And each execution expressed the same simple truth: with quattro, the road surface no longer defines your drive.
We bent landscapes around the Audi through optical illusions and custom installations. Transformed rough natural textures into smooth surfaces. And reimagined Audi’s distinctive four rings as bubbles in a level, staying perfectly still through a drive.
“I could have gone faster, even at the steepest point.”
Uwe Bleck, Audi engineer, after driving an Audi with quattro up a 37.5-degree ski jump
Impact
quattro is becoming a reason to choose again.
Early results show search interest climbed sharply, putting the technology back in the consideration set, with a particular rise among women. Further, quattro has gained positive perception on the balance of innovation, performance and safety.
