Wall and Chain

The integrated campaign ‘Wall and Chain’ highlights Airbnb’s ability to help people feel like they belong anywhere.

VCCP Berlin has created a content-led campaign for Airbnb, to celebrate an historic moment in Germany’s history – the 25th Anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

The integrated campaign ‘Wall and Chain’ highlights Airbnb’s ability to help people feel like they belong anywhere.

The emotional story is centred around a West-German border guard in 1987, who leaves the city after completing his service. However, even after settling in Denmark, his experience of the Wall acted as ‘a barrier between him and the rest of the world’. As a result, his daughter plans a trip to Berlin to show him what a beautiful city it has become, and books an apartment through Airbnb. Upon their arrival, the former guard realizes that the man who welcomes them to his apartment is in fact the guard he once knew from the East side of the Wall. Through his present encounter with the border guard he knew in the past, the protagonist is finally able to overcome his distress from the Wall.

The campaign was hosted online via www.belonganywhere.com/berlin. Users were able to learn more about the touching story through interviews with the former guards. Users were also free to share their personal Airbnb stories via the campaign website. The activity was then promoted through various social media channels, in addition to YouTube and Vimeo.