Carmaker places world's lowest advert

(Alfa Romeo)

A car manufacturer has placed an advert 11,000 meters (36,089 feet) under sea level, in a stunt designed to advertise prices that "won't go any lower."

The 2-meter wide billboard was lowered to the bottom of the Mariana Trench, 33 km (21 miles) off the island of Guam in the North Pacific, by Alfa Romeo and ad agency Duval Guillaume. Twelve kilometers (7.5 miles) of cable were used to lower a plastic billboard encased in a pressure-resistant stainless steel case. Alfa Romeo has shown footage of the board at the bottom of the ocean after an 11-hour descent.

The Mariana Trench is the deepest known part of the world's oceans and the lowest known part of the earth's crust, where water pressure is roughly 1000 times that of sea-level atmospheric pressure. Only three descents have ever been achieved. To support the campaign, for sales of the Alfa Romeo 147, Alfa Romeo has released a YouTube documentary about the "adventure."

Swedish car manufacturer Volvo pioneered the documentary marketing genre with its The Mystery of Dalarö adverts in 2004. The eight-minute film, centered on a small town in Sweden where 34 people had supposedly bought the same car on the same day, was later exposed as a fake, garnering even more interest.

Website: http://www.expedition147.be/