Motel Lets Trees Do the Talking in Campaign for Train Hugger

The sustainable rail ticketing platform, Train Hugger, has partnered with UK creative agency Motel to tell travellers how booking trains through them means they can also do their bit for the planet. 

For every train journey purchased, Train Hugger plants a tree locally in the UK, thus rewilding Britain one trip (and tree) at a time. A simple and clear promise that needed a simple and clear idea for its launch campaign. This led Motel to think, who better to recommend people to book with Train Hugger than the trees themselves? 

Subverting classic customer testimonials, we get to hear from a ‘Birch in Berkshire’, a ‘Sycamore in Surrey’ and a ‘Maple in Middlesex’. Of course, these tree endorsements also inform people how the easy step of switching to a different train booking app can have a positive impact. 

Travellers want to go out and live their lives but are increasingly wary of their often negative impact on the environment. With Train Hugger, they can travel knowing that each journey means a tree gets planted locally in the UK - without having to pay more for their ticket.

Bringing the trees to life in the posters nicely mirrors what Train Hugger does whenever someone books a train journey on their platform. This also taps into online trends of people noticing face-like features in their surroundings, be it in sockets, slices of toast, bags or trees. Manipulating the tree bark structures and textures created unique expressions to bring the trees to life in this campaign. 

With many people becoming increasingly indifferent to environmental messages, the campaign was designed to grab attention and entertain. The twist is to have trees cheekily asking us to book on Train Hugger for their benefit, not ours. 

The tone of the campaign is also in keeping with one of Train Hugger’s missions: to allow travellers to feel good about living their lives without feeling worried about their environmental impact. 

The campaign will be running across DOOH, Social and CRM in the UK from 14th August 2023 and extends across all aspects of Train Hugger marketing from internal communications to customer emails.

Ed Caldecott, CEO and co-founder of Train Hugger says, “We are absolutely delighted by Motel's flare for mischief and creativity. They have delivered a really exciting campaign, which has transformed the way we talk to our customers and the way we think of our brand.” 

Lee Tan, co-founder and CCO at Motel adds, “To do a little good, and pay no more for your ticket, feels like a no-brainer. So much so, even the trees think so.” 

No comment from the trees themselves, as they’ve gone back to being normal trees so as to not let the fame rise to their heads.