Etat de Vaud — Campaign , digital by twks: Turning an instruction manual
into a survival instinct.

We hacked the most ignored object in the world and made it the most useful: the instruction manual. Everyone knows the reflex. You only open it once you've tried everything: when the shelf won't fit, when a screw seems to be missing, when nothing works anymore. You look for the right move at the worst possible moment, once the emergency has already begun. We turned that universal reflex into a tool for emergency preparedness.

Emergencies are frightening. The character explaining them shouldn't be. We created Popy, a round, genderless, ageless silhouette that everyone can see themselves in. Not a police officer, not a doctor, not a figure of authority. Just a familiar, almost endearing presence, in the spirit of Pixar's characters: a simple line, a universal expression, a face you remember without trying. Popy doesn't give orders. Popy shows you what to do.

We borrowed the universal codes of the instruction manual: pictograms, numbered steps, visual language. Twelve guides, one hazard at a time: drought, heatwaves, power cuts, forest fires, earthquakes, cyberattacks and more. Each one covers understanding, preparing, reacting and staying informed, before, during and after a crisis. Popy, the mascot behind the whole system, turns every page into an instantly recognisable visual cue, with a touch of humour that aids memory without ever undercutting the seriousness of the message.

INFOPOP sits within the Canton of Vaud's wider preparedness toolkit. It complements Alertswiss in particular, a platform we worked on directly to make its pictograms accessible to the whole Swiss population for real-time alerts. It also points people towards the Emergency Meeting Points, there for when communications go down, and the Personal Emergency Plan, designed to help everyone think ahead of a crisis.

INFOPOP replaces nothing. INFOPOP prepares.