Every year over 1.8 million used mattresses are illegally dumped on busy Australian streets every year. Soiled, stained, and soggy, they’re an unhygienic, unmissable eye sore for everyone who sees them. But where the world saw ugliness, we saw a gamechanging way to launch mattress brand 10:PM, who lacked the budget to afford billboards, like their competitors. We did this by turning dumped mattresses into ‘Bedverts’, a new 100% free media space, made entirely from competitor’s abandoned products. 

Using social listening and street teams we located illegally dumped competitor mattresses in major suburbs in Sydney, 10:PM’s key launch market. The found mattresses were analyzed by a microbiologist, then turned into community-specific long copy ads, highlighting the disgusting organic stains and flaws of each - all in real time. 

Bedverts were elegantly displayed like real billboards in the original location then filmed, photographed and shared out on 10:PM and influencer social channels to amplify the campaign’s reach. To further fuel conversation and add credibility, a microbiologist analysed samples of stains from our mattresses and shared their findings with the media. Finally, the Bedverts were taken to landfill at the end of their media cycle for responsible disposal. 

The outcome 

10:PM’s competition frequently advertise on OOH. With a lean production budget, we blanketed Sydney with outdoor executions in exclusive, high traffic areas. The campaign, press and influencer response to Bed-verts generated +5 million impressions in one week, reaching 75% of Metropolitan Sydney. The campaign featured across popular news and radio spots 9 Honey, The New Daily and Smooth FM, helping 10:PM generate the equivalent of +$1.6million worth in outdoor media and over 130 pieces of PR coverage, for an actual media budget of $0. Ensuring their competitors lost hundreds of hours of sleep.