With an extreme live-event, Fürs Leben showed people how hard waiting for an organ can get. In a place where everybody hates waiting: at the train station.

Fürs Leben (Foundation for Life) organ donation campaign “Waiting. For Seven Years” (Warten. 7 Jahre lang) recently won the Grand Global Award in recognition of excellence of health-related advertising.

Michael Stapf, a 27 year old, was placed on a Frankfurt railway station platform with his dialysis machine. People passing by discovered that he had been waiting for a kidney donation for seven years.

A digital billboard at the platform also called for action, stating: “Some of us have been waiting longer. For an organ donation. Help with an organ donor card on www.fuers-leben.de or as app”.

Online viewers of the “Waiting Time Experiment” mini documentary discovered that patients in Germany have to wait so long for a transplant that three of them die every day. The reason being that too few have an orgon donor card.

The aim to raise awareness also extended to social media. Michael Stapf’s genuine identity was provided with a semi-public Facebook profile.

The Waiting campaign was developed at Ogilvy, Germany, and helped Michael become the centre of a social media debate. His story was featured on many TV programs. Website visits increased by 33% during the 6-week-campaign. Over 16,000 organ donor cards and apps were downloaded.