Lutz Kothe visited the Madersbacher Eide family more than a year ago, and told them about his work as Head of Marketing for Volkswagen AG in Mumbai, India. Beatrix (then in 7^th grade) was thrilled and interested to hear about this, and promised her uncle to think about some ideas for advertising. She made sketches and descriptions, and sent a detailed letter to India.

 

Half a year later she received an unexpected phone call from India. It was Neeraj Garg, the Director of Volkswagen AG, whom congratulated Bea on her advertising idea.

 

 

What had happened? In all of India the first talking newspaper had created quite a stir. Superstitious housemaids thought that ghosts were talking to them, from the Times of India and the Hindu – the two most important newspapers. Others thought the walls were coming alive and spoke out loud. Children and teenagers discovered the sound chip as a valuable new trade object. The reason for all this commotion was a small, light sensitive chip that began to speak when you opened the newspaper – similar to the birthday cards with sound that we know here in Europe. Next to a full page ad, the voice spoke of the innovative features and engineering in the new Volkswagen Vento car.

 

2.5 million of these acoustic chips were embedded in newspapers overnight for distribution in all of India, and created a storm of attention for Volkswagen that then translated into significantly higher sales figures. In addition, the unique advertising idea became the “talk of the town”, with Indians talking about it in the streets, in chat rooms, and articles appeared among others in The Economic Times.

 

For Beatrix it came as a complete surprise that her advertising idea had been developed and realized, and been so successful. “Suddenly I received a phone call from India and somebody told me in accented English that my idea had been developed. Later my uncle offered me a 2 week internship at VW India, I’m already looking forward to it!”