Most of the world, it seems, has been mapped on Google Street View—some 220 billion images covering more than 10 million miles of roads in 100 countries as of 2022, according to Google.

But what about hiking trails?

Yeti saw the lack of such maps in nature as a barrier to access for the everyday person interested in exploring the outdoors. So, the cooler and drinkware maker embarked on a project called “Map the Gaps” to create such maps. To start with, it got 13 of its brand ambassadors to map 15 of their favorite trails using GoPro cameras—then uploaded them to Street View.

The content is now available as video walkthroughs on a new “Map the Gaps” website, as well as natively on Street View itself, where users can employ the interface’s familiar click- and tap-ahead functionality, and 360-degree views, to move through the landscape.

Below is a project video that explains more.

“Accessing nature can be hard for many people who aren’t familiar with it,” Paulie Dery, chief marketing officer at Yeti, told Ad Age. “How do you get out there? What’s it like? What do you do out there? I think a big barrier to access to the wild is actually access to information.” 

Also read: Yeti CMO on the brand’s latest viral ads

The project has mapped 14 trails in North America and one in Australia. The ambassadors include Conrad Anker, Maddie Brenneman, Averie Swanson, Jo Barrett and David Mangum. In addition to mapping the length of each trail, the ambassadors also added waypoints they found interesting—adding more richness and depth to the maps.

There’s also a product tie-in. The project was in development just as Yeti was expanding its M Series of soft coolers, adding the Hopper M15 Tote and Hopper M12 Backpack to the lineup. All the ambassadors carried Hopper coolers on their hikes—which becomes a kind of product placement when Street View users access the maps.

The soft coolers are portable and perfect for day hikes, said Dery.

“We find all sorts of people use them,” he said. “Surfers, for example, because they go deep into places to get their breaks. Fish folk, too—they park their car and go three hours into a river. This product’s awesome for that.” 

The Street View maps will help people plan ahead, to know what to expect on a particular hike, which instills confidence and thus broadens access, Dery said.

“It’s a huge time commitment, committing to a trail,” he said. “You want to make sure it’s beautiful and awesome, but you also want to check out the terrain. Not everyone is Conrad Anker, who does epic mountain peaks just to warm up. This will help people feel confident and takes a bit of the scariness out of it.” 

The marketer did have a few concerns going into the project—first, that the ambassadors might not want to publicize their favorite spots; and second, that some people might object to having yet more technology into nature. But in the end, the upsides far outweighed the concerns.

“The ambassadors were the opposite—they were like, ‘Look, the more people that can experience our world, we believe the world would be better for it,’” said Dery. “And the technology, as well, just encourages people to explore more. We always say the best of human nature is humans in nature. Anything we can do to get people outdoors, we’ll continue to do.” 

Fifteen trails are obviously just a tiny fraction of the wilderness. But Dery said he hopes people might use “Map the Gaps” as inspiration to start mapping trails themselves.

“We hope more ambassadors pick up the challenge. We also encourage anyone to add trails to the Google API—we’d love to see that,” he said. “We also think there’s just something cool about virtually doing a trail with some of the best explorers on the planet.” 

“Map the Gaps” is being highlighted in some of the current marketing for the M Series coolers. Yeti is also highlighting it in print ads in what Dery called “endemic publications” targeting enthusiasts. “They’re not the biggest publications in the world, but they’re really important to our core communities,” he said. 

Yeti concepted “Map the Gaps” in-house. The web experience was built by Code & Theory. The campaign follows a well-received print, digital and outdoor effort earlier this year focused on sustainability.