Renault Plug Inn Turns Private Home Chargers Into a National EV Network
Renault Plug Inn is a peer-to-peer mobile application that connects electric vehicle drivers in France with private home-charger owners, allowing drivers to find and book available charging points in real time while enabling charger owners to earn income by renting out their installations — a model conceived and developed by Publicis Conseil, Publicis Sapient, and Epsilon for Renault, Renault Zoe, and Renault E-Tech, and promoted as a 2023 campaign case study.
The context that gave Plug Inn its urgency was stark. By 2022, there were 1 million electric cars on French roads, yet only 80,000 public charging stations existed to serve them, according to Clapboard's editorial record. In remote and rural parts of France, the number of available charging points fell to zero, generating a documented phenomenon known as range anxiety — the fear that a vehicle's battery will be exhausted before a charging point can be reached. That anxiety was suppressing the transition from internal combustion to electric vehicles at precisely the moment Renault needed to accelerate it.
Renault's strategic brief was specific: grow the charging network rapidly without incurring the financial and bureaucratic overhead of constructing new public infrastructure. The solution Publicis Conseil conceived was architectural rather than promotional. Rather than advertising around an existing product, the agency designed an entirely new service — a platform that monetised the estimated hundreds of thousands of private home chargers already installed across France, making them bookable by any driver in need. The platform was positioned internally as an Airbnb for charging spots, as described by Publicis Sapient and quoted by Contagious in its Cannes Lions Creative Strategy winners 2023 article. According to publicissapient.com, the team developed the full vision, business case, and minimum viable product in eight weeks. Plug Inn launched in June 2023 and, according to Clapboard's editorial record, reached 16,000 users and 107 million impressions within its first two weeks in the French market. The campaign earned a Clapboard Score of 88 out of 100.
France's electric vehicle charging deficit defined the strategic opportunity. With 1 million electric cars in circulation and only 80,000 public charging stations available as of 2022, according to Clapboard's editorial record, the ratio of vehicles to charge points created a structural bottleneck that no amount of conventional advertising could resolve. Renault and Publicis Conseil chose to address the infrastructure problem directly rather than manage consumer perception around it.
The strategic lineage of Plug Inn traces back to a 2020 Renault initiative called Village Électrique, in which the brand supplied Renault Zoe electric cars to households in Appy, France, creating what was described as the country's first fully electric village, according to adsoftheworld.com. Village Électrique demonstrated that EV adoption could function outside major cities and established charging corridors when the supporting infrastructure was present. It won a Grand Prix at Cannes Lions in the Outdoor category, according to clapboard.com, and planted a central hypothesis: communities, not just corporations, could be the engine of charging network growth. Plug Inn operationalised that hypothesis at national scale across France.
Globally, electric-car sales reached nearly 14 million units in 2023, up approximately 35 percent year over year, according to the International Energy Agency. In Europe, EVs accounted for nearly 25 percent of new EV registrations that year, according to the IEA, placing France within one of the world's most competitive and policy-driven automotive markets. Competitors including Tesla and Volkswagen Group were investing heavily in proprietary charging infrastructure during the same period, making Renault's community-sourced approach a deliberate strategic contrast. By targeting the private home-charger owner as a network participant rather than a passive consumer, Plug Inn created a scalable supply-side asset that neither Tesla's Supercharger network nor Volkswagen's Ionity partnership could replicate through the same peer-to-peer mechanics. According to adsoftheworld.com, the platform was designed with the potential to add up to 475,000 new charging points through local communities, particularly in the remote regions of France where the public network did not reach.
Publicis Conseil led the creative concept for Plug Inn, with Marco Venturelli serving as CEO and CCO of the agency, according to publicisconseil.fr. Marcelo Vergara served as Worldwide Creative Director at Publicis Conseil for the campaign, according to the same source. The broader execution involved Publicis Sapient handling product development and Epsilon contributing data and CRM capabilities — a cross-disciplinary assembly that reflected the campaign's ambition to function as a business transformation rather than a conventional advertising project.
The creative idea was structurally elegant. Rather than producing a film or a print campaign that asked consumers to trust Renault's commitment to electric mobility, the agency built a working product that embodied that commitment. The peer-to-peer booking interface allowed EV drivers in France to search for home chargers in their vicinity, reserve a time slot, and pay through the app, while charger owners could list their installations and manage bookings — mechanics directly analogous to short-term rental platforms, hence the Airbnb for plugs formulation that Publicis Sapient used publicly, as cited by Contagious. According to publicissapient.com, the complete product — from strategic vision through to minimum viable product — was delivered in eight weeks, a development timeline that speaks to the integration of creative, technology, and business design disciplines within a single campaign structure.
The campaign drew on Renault's prior creative platform established through Village Électrique, maintaining the brand's consistent positioning around community-led electric mobility solutions in France rather than technology-led ones. The earned media strategy was calibrated to amplify proof of the platform's utility: real users in real remote locations of France discovering charge points that had not existed in the public network. That authenticity loop — service creates story, story drives adoption — was central to the creative architecture. According to Arthur Sadoun, Chairman and CEO of Publicis Groupe, writing in Campaign Canada in December 2025, Plug Inn represented "a brilliant creative idea from Publicis Conseil brought to life by our cutting-edge capabilities."
Renault Plug Inn delivered measurable results in France within weeks of its June 2023 launch. According to Clapboard's editorial record, the application reached 16,000 users in its first two weeks, generated 107 million impressions, and earned more than 500,000 euros in earned media value. Those figures represent the verified performance data on public record for the campaign.
The awards recognition was extensive and independently verified. At Cannes Lions 2023, Plug Inn won the Grand Prix in Creative Strategy in the Automotive category, a Gold Lion in Creative Business Transformation in the Service Design category, a Gold Lion in Mobile-led Commerce in the Mobile category, and a Silver Lion in Creative Strategy in the Products and Services category, according to Clapboard's editorial record. At Eurobest 2023, the campaign won three Grand Prix awards across Creative Commerce, Creative Strategy, and Creative Business Transformation, according to clapboard.com. At the Clio Awards 2024, Plug Inn received a Grand Clio in Creative Business Transformation, according to Clapboard's editorial record. The ANDY Awards 2024 listed a Gold in the Idea category, though independent verification beyond the campaign listing is not available.
The structural effectiveness of Plug Inn rests on a supply-side mechanic that grows the network's value with each new participant — a compounding asset that conventional automotive campaigns do not generate. The potential addition of up to 475,000 charging points through community participation, as reported by adsoftheworld.com, would represent a fundamental change to the electric vehicle charging landscape in France at a fraction of the cost of equivalent public infrastructure. Renault Plug Inn earns a Clapboard Score of 88 out of 100, reflecting the campaign's rare combination of genuine product innovation, creative clarity, and independently verified commercial and cultural impact.
Renault Plug Inn is a peer-to-peer mobile app that connects electric vehicle drivers in France with private home-charger owners. Drivers search for and book available charge points through the app, while owners earn income by renting out their installations — expanding the French charging network into areas with no public infrastructure, including remote rural locations.
Publicis Conseil led the creative concept for Renault Plug Inn, with Publicis Sapient building the product and Epsilon providing data capabilities. Marco Venturelli served as CEO and CCO of Publicis Conseil, with Marcelo Vergara as Worldwide Creative Director. Arthur Sadoun of Publicis Groupe publicly credited Publicis Conseil for the core creative idea behind the campaign.
Renault Plug Inn won the Grand Prix in Creative Strategy in the Automotive category at Cannes Lions 2023, along with two Gold Lions and a Silver Lion, according to Clapboard's editorial record. The campaign also won three Grand Prix awards at Eurobest 2023 and a Grand Clio at the Clio Awards 2024 in Creative Business Transformation.
Renault Plug Inn reached 16,000 users within its first two weeks of launch in France, according to Clapboard's editorial record. The campaign simultaneously generated 107 million impressions and earned more than 500,000 euros in earned media value, establishing rapid traction for a new service with no legacy user base in the French market.
Village Électrique, a 2020 Renault initiative documented by adsoftheworld.com, supplied Renault Zoe cars to Appy, France, creating the country's first fully electric village. It won a Cannes Lions Grand Prix in Outdoor and proved that community-based EV adoption works in remote areas. Plug Inn extended that same strategic logic into a scalable national peer-to-peer platform.
France had 1 million electric cars but only 80,000 public charging stations by 2022, according to Clapboard's editorial record, leaving remote regions with zero charging infrastructure. This gap created range anxiety and slowed EV adoption. Plug Inn addressed the deficit by activating privately owned home chargers as bookable public assets, with potential to add up to 475,000 new points according to adsoftheworld.com.
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