Helmet Has Always Been a Good Idea

We Danes love our bikes. In fact, 90% of all Danes own one and bike an average of 3.46 km per day. There’s one problem, however; helmets have never become as popular as biking itself. This is despite the fact that around 70% of all serious road traffic injuries in Denmark happen to cyclists. So why such apprehension towards putting on a helmet, when the safety benefits of wearing one are so painfully obvious?

Insight: There’s no good excuse for not wearing a helmet.

We picked the minds of Danish cyclists, and while there was no shortage of excuses, none brought any real light to the problem. In short: there’s not one good excuse for not wearing a helmet – but there’s a very long list of poor ones.

Danes are no strangers to protective headgear. In fact, we’ve worn it since the Vikings set sails for England. In the hero video, we put the bad excuses of today into the mouth of King Sven, all set up to plunder abroad. The absurdity of these excuses stood out loud and clear even from the year 893.

Rollout

A highly emotional and self-ironic hero video was the main tool to get into the unwisely helmet-free heads of the Danes. We wanted it to travel on social media and spur as much discussion and PR as possible.

Nine out of ten who had seen the film agreed with the main message, that wearing a helmet when biking is a good idea, if you want to protect your head.

• +87% campaign-liking
• The majority (86%) reflected on the relevance of helmets over vanity
• Seven out of ten non-helmet users found the film relevant
• 91% of viewers thought the film would be relevant to others
• One-third of non-users seriously considered purchasing a helmet after having seen the film – and 4% actually did