PROBLEM
Mastercard launched their contactless tap transaction technology in New Zealand way back in 2013, but constant advertising had failed to make an impact: 76% of New Zealanders still didn’t tap at checkout.
New Zealand was a nation of card-inserting PIN punchers.
And we needed to change that.
SOLUTION
To change the transaction behaviour of an entire nation, we made tapping more than just a way to pay.
Tap For Your Town gave all New Zealanders the opportunity to bring former All Blacks captain Richie McCaw out of retirement to play a game of tap rugby against their town’s local team.
The rules were simple: the town with the most taps would win.
Tap Rugby quickly became New Zealand’s new favourite sport, and when Queenstown emerged victorious with an incredible 11.2 taps per capita, the game between Richie’s All Stars and the (somewhat confusingly-named) ‘Arrowtown’ locals was broadcast to 480k New Zealanders on Facebook Live – making it the biggest game of touch rugby in New Zealand’s history.
Tap For Your Town generated 13.24 million taps in just 10 weeks, and delivered over NZD$212 million of value to Mastercard in 2018.