Over the last two decades, political changes in the United States, particularly the concern over government spending and the federal budget deficit, have made NASA more difficult to obtain approval and funding for large and expensive research and development project. In order to cope with budget-constrained environment which already jeopardizing NASA as an institution, NASA's officials had considered ways in which social marketing techniques can be used to promote space shuttle service system. Using NASA's space shuttle service system as an example, the article examines the concept of "social marketing" and the difficulties in making marketing decisions for space shuttle operations. It shows that the impact of the marketing space shuttle program had facilitated restructuring NASA toward a resilient institution. A restructured NASA might become a model for other agencies. Lastly, the issues relating to government's increased use of social marketing are also discussed.