With its striking red accents, a life-size MINI car model is fixed to a huge billboard at a junction in Shanghai. Facing the sky, the car is attached as if on a catapult, ready to be launched. Large, illuminated text under the model shows the tagline: “Don’t push the button” and “别碰！” (lit. don’t touch!).
This reverse and vaguely threatening play on the old Kodak slogan (“You press the button, we do the rest”) was for MINI’s new John Cooper Works (JCW) cars on the Somekh Building on the Bund in Shanghai. Ahead of the Auto Shanghai 2025 show, the public installation will be available to view between 20 and 25 April.
Other than the large-scale launchpad-esque installation, there is also a cool 3D effect. Visitors who enter the gate underneath the billboard and go into the building will see a big red button in front of the board repeating the warning. If you defy the warning and press the button (with the word “boost” on it), the machine will print a slip with a QR code for you. If you scan it with your phone, an AR version of the car on the wall will be shot into the stratosphere on your screen.
Other than the installation and its Auto Shanghai exhibit, MINI also launched a pop-up space in Shanghai between 21 April and 2 May, called MINI filling station number 37. More car displays and “check-in” (打卡) photo op spots are provided. The British car maker has been doubling down on marketing in China with celebrities as well as offline campaigns. Facing stiff competition in the EV market in China, MINI, with its “small car” USP and recent campaigns, might just crack the code on reaching its audiences in the country.
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