Once Upon a Ride

Animated Series

AGENCY
Uber &Co (internal agency)

ROLE
Copywriter
+more

Once Upon a Ride (formerly called Stories From the Road), is an unscripted, animated series highlighting unbelievable Uber trips, all narrated by the actual riders and drivers. I crafted the narratives, created content for our channels, helped plan the rollout, and worked some magic to source serendipitous moments.

How to script an unscripted series

I started by editing the rider and driver summaries into basic, :60 story outlines. Next, I drafted interview questions to make sure we got the structure, story and soundbites we were hoping to get. We kept the interviews conversational, and I purposefully crafted each to match the rider or driver’s own voice to make sure their story was told in their own words. After conducting the interviews, Joel and I would work together to figure out what story details we could tell visually to save time, how we could make .GIF-able scenes, and how we could make trailers.

Finished product

Rollout

Challenge

Prior to Once Upon a Ride, Uber wasn’t properly rolling out content on our social channels. I worked with our CRM and Social team to plan a proper release that spread each story out over a month instead of having all content drop on one day.