Vaseline turned idle hand-sanitizer stands into sunscreen dispensers at building exits

Indonesia sits on the equator, where the UV index regularly reaches High Risk to Extreme levels, yet most Indonesians saw sunscreen as a beach product rather than daily protection. Dermatologists recommend applying and reapplying it before going out, but the habit had never formed.

COVID had built the perfect template: hand-sanitizer dispensers became ubiquitous at building entrances and trained millions to pump before entering. As the pandemic faded, those stands sat idle — the habit was dissolving with them.

Vaseline and VML collected the unused dispensers, cleaned and refilled them with Vaseline SPF50+ sunscreen, and reinstalled them facing outward, so people applied protection as they left buildings, offices and tourist sites. QR codes linked each stand to sun-protection education and direct purchase pages, turning the pumps into free sampling and retail media at once.

Surveyed users at participating buildings reported that more than 32% actively used the Sunitizers and another 27% had used them at least once; of those, over 52% said they would keep using sunscreen. The work took Bronze in Citra Pariwara for Good at Citra Pariwara 37 and a Gold at the MMA Smarties Indonesia 2025.

Anchor the new habit to infrastructure people already trust

It replaced a fading habit with a familiar one using hardware that already existed, so the campaign scaled without building any new infrastructure.

The exit-facing placement made the sunscreen a moment of protection rather than an interruption, converting a passive audience into samplers.

Each dispenser doubled as media: education, trial and e-commerce sat on the same QR code, closing the loop from awareness to purchase.

The upcycling story gave the campaign shareable proof of how it worked, spreading word-of-mouth about UV exposure on its own.

When a behavior fades, anchor the new habit to the old one's infrastructure instead of asking people to change. Familiar position and gesture did the persuading; the brand only changed what came out.

Unilever Indonesia committed to keep upcycling abandoned dispensers and placing Sunitizers in high-footfall areas across multiple cities through 2024 and 2025. The campaign earned Bronze in the Citra Pariwara for Good category at Citra Pariwara 37 (December 2024), a Gold at MMA Smarties Indonesia 2025, and was featured in the ADFEST 2025 winners showcase as a field-marketing case.