Canadian Tire motivates motorists

Every year, Canadians wait until the first snowfall to change their vehicle's summer tires to winter tires. Almost everyone rushes to the store to get their tires changed, and business is lost as Canadian Tire can't meet the compressed surplus demand.

The idea behind "Winter is coming" was to communicate to motorists that when temperatures dip below 7°C and their breath becomes visible in the cold air, then it's time to make the switch to winter tires.

Canadian Tire and Touché! partnered with Skype and placed ads on the program. In the ad, users were invited to "exhale into your microphone for a winter tires reminder" and when the microphone picked up the action, the screen frosted up, mimicking the frost on a cold window. It also supported the Skype ads with an online campaign.

Canadian Tire experienced an 11% increase in snow tire sales year-over-year, and 38% of the tires were installed in the three weeks preceding last year's schedule. Microsoft awarded the concept a "Best Of" Award in recognition of the innovative use of technology and for doubling previous engagement benchmarks on its network.