Captain Obvious reporting: millions of people ride the Moscow Metro every day. We figured not all of them have read our newspaper yet (especially since we’ve just launched a new one), so we started a new project called "Underground." For participants, it works like a quest: ride from the starting station to the turnaround point and back, while: - handing out as many newspapers as possible to passengers and wishing them a good day; - enjoying the feeling of doing something useful and important. In its first three days, the project proved super effective: 40 people handed out about 11,000 newspapers in just a couple of hours, had a good time (which matters), and almost never ran into the police. And those who did just spent an extra 30 minutes talking to law enforcement officers, because handing out campaign materials is not a violation at all — it is completely legal. And most importantly, we see the results immediately. Stepping out of a train car and seeing every other passenger reading our paper is priceless. Here’s how it works: we set up 1–2 starting cubes at transfer stations in the metro. These starting cubes serve as a base for volunteers. At the starting cube, people get T-shirts and bags full of newspapers; they can leave their belongings there and even change clothes right inside the cube (soon we’ll add a small kitchen to every cube too).
Specially trained people brief the volunteers, and every 30 minutes a group of 10–15 people heads underground from the starting cube. (I’ve always dreamed of writing a post containing the words "every 30 minutes, groups of volunteers head underground")
The volunteers enter each train car in pairs (through the first and last doors) and, moving toward each other, hand out newspapers to passengers.
At the next station, they get off, wait for the next train, and do it all again. Then they ride to the turnaround station and head back to the starting cube. They come back up to street level and, if they feel like it, repeat their star landing all over again.
Metro passengers turned out to be very hungry for information: they take the newspaper eagerly, and when the car is crowded, they pass it along over people’s heads.
So, here’s the point of all this: we want to turn the metro project into a mega metro project. The metro is better than Autoradio (a popular Russian radio station). There’s simply no other way to reach this many voters. Especially since these are voters who don’t know how to spend twenty minutes in a train car and are happy to read whatever is put into their hands. Without you, none of this will work, so just come campaign in the metro. It’s fun, interesting, and extremely effective. Today, 20.08, the starting cube is already operating at Barrikadnaya metro station (Barrikadnaya Street, 8 bldg. 8). Campaign teams leave from there every 30 minutes. Tomorrow, 21.08, the starting cube will be at Novokuznetskaya metro station (by the metro exit), from 14:00 to 21:00. We’ll also be heading out every 30 minutes, depending on how many volunteers arrive. We really need you. Come and spend an hour or two of your time doing something useful.