A new kind of car chase

In September, when Audi of America and ad agency McKinney & Silver started planning the spring 2005 launch of its new A3 model, no one in the room imagined how unusual a campaign would result.

It began with a staged car theft at a New York City Audi dealership. Then, much to the confusion of event organizers, Audi posted handbills, seeking information about the theft, at the New York International Auto Show last March. That beginning, as intriguing as the start of a John Grisham novel, was then augmented by ads -- placed in major magazines, blogs, and streaming video -- featuring fictional people purporting to capture moments of the whodunit tale. It was all done in the name of generating chatter about Audi.

Actors from this cyberspace/terrestrial play have shown up at a major musical festival and will be in character when they stage fights, thefts, or escapes -- it's hard to know -- in Los Angeles at the E3 Expo show (May 18 to 20) for the interactive media industry. The whole marketing campaign has included so many risky and untried elements that Audi had to employ a full-time lawyer as part of the ad team.

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