Ad agency hopes to woo EU's reluctant voters

Lutz Meyer may have taken on the most challenging campaign in the history of advertising: convincing people to vote in this June's European parliament elections.

Turnout in the last European elections, in 2004, was 48 per cent, 18 percentage points lower than in the first parliamentary elections in 1979 in spite of the increased powers the institution has garnered since then. In Slovakia it was just 17 per cent.

This year, in an effort to turn that around, the parliament abandoned its usual practice of engaging local advertising agencies and hired Scholz & Friends European Agenda, Mr Lutz's Berlin-based firm, to mount an EU-wide campaign.

"There has not been a campaign like this before. This is completely new, and it is a great challenge," says Mr Lutz, who recruited Claudia Schiffer and giant plastic aspirin to sell Germany as "the land of ideas" for the 2006 football World Cup.

The European election sets several challenges for Mr Lutz. Unlike national elections, the contest does not promise voters the satisfaction of toppling the executive. Unlike the US presidential election, there is no Barack Obama or Sarah Palin-esque star. Finally, there are many different languages – 35 of them.

Mr Lutz says the EU enjoys better brand awareness than clothing label Armani. The problem, he says, is that people tend to associate it with red tape, corruption and inefficiency. As for the parliament, its legislative good works have been obscured by the incremental gear-turning of bureaucratic process.

"We want to show that the decisions being taken in Brussels are relevant to people," Mr Lutz says.

To that end, Scholz has concocted a set of billboards that highlight key issues tackled by the parliament – from consumer safety to borderpolicy and financial regulation.

Each billboard features two options, such as a chicken breast packaged with a dozen warning signs next to another with none. "We are saying: 'You can have it this way or that way. It's your choice'."

In a flexible interpretation of the European single market, each country will have the option to choose which issues to highlight based on local relevance. Border policy, for example, is expected to play better in Italy than Germany.

For the campaign to succeed, Mr Lutz is hoping to use Facebook and various publicity stunts to reach young voters, who may not remember the bad old days of the 1930s and 1940s and take the EU for granted. He will also have to address Slovakia, where turnout was so low in 2004.

The budget for the campaign is €28m ($38m, £26m), or about 5 cents per voter. If Mr Lutz fails, the parliament could always use its legislative powers to push for compulsory elections.

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