Transport for NSW & Sydney Swans Team Up For ‘Don’t Fly Blind’ Anti Mobile Phone Driver Distraction Campaign

June saw Transport for NSW activate its partnership with AFL/AFLW side Sydney Swans with its annual ‘Get Your Hand Off It’ initiative highlighting the dangers of using mobile phones while driving led by a spot titled ‘Don’t Fly Blind’.

The social, digital and in-stadium campaign, created and produced in harness with agency Gemba, raises awareness of the dangers of driving illegally using a mobile phone and encourages drivers to avoid mobile phone distraction.

The hero ‘Get Your Hand Off It: Don’t Fly Blind With Sydney Swans’ dropped on 16 June shows how (badly) Swans players performed blindfolded. The creative approach is a fun way to drive home a serious message and revolves around an experiment with a trio of Sydney Swans stars playing, catching and kicking blindfolded to reinforce the core campaign message: ‘Don’t get distracted by your phone while driving’.

The content captures how it was next to impossible for Swans stars Tom McCartin, Harry Cunningham and Callum Mills to complete any of their usual footy moves and skills ‘flying blind’.

As the campaign explained: “Looking at your phone for just 2 seconds at 60km/ph means you’re driving blind for over 33 meters. Don’t be distracted by your phone. Get your hand off it while driving and stay safe this season”.

Supporting the hero video was a in-stadia big screen activation called ‘Distracted Cam’: a live and interactive execution which sees a camera – with its live feed relayed to the big in-stadium screen in the Sydney Cricket Ground – seeking out and showing fans distracted by their phones rather than enjoying the full matchday experience.

“This was loads of fun to make. It’s always nice to use athletes in a way that lets them do what they do best – perform… albeit blindfolded in this case!” said Gemba Creative Director John Weir. “But importantly, we also had a serious message which we had to impart – namely, ‘get your hand off your phone while driving’. And I think that’s something we definitely landed with this campaign.”

The campaign was created for client team at Transport for NSW which was led by Director of Marketing & Sponsorship Paul Ibsen and Sponsorships & Partnerships Executive Sally English by lead agency Gemba where the group working on the campaign included Executive Creative Director Boyd Hicklin, Creative Director John Weir, Senior Manager (Creative & Production) Alexandra Longbottom, Creative Producer Ally Kirkwood, Graphic Designer Honey Terrill, Senior Account Director Hugh Rogan, Account Manager Alannah Brady and Senior Marketing Consultant Brandon Stobbs.

The production company was Chisel Productions with Director Patrick Sidoti, Executive Producer Isabelle Seeto, Production Manager Pippa Martino, Director of Photography Peter Danks and Editor Benjamin Bowles. Sound was handled by KLANG and Music Ideas.

Comment

This campaign follows on from previous iterations of an annual initiative – which included 2017’s ‘Get Your Hands Off’ work featuring Kieren Jack, Sam Reid, Callum Sinclair and Heath Grundy – which began back in 2014.