In the Philippines, family members are forced to leave home to work for higher salaries to support their families. Over 10M work overseas. Countless others from far-flung provinces work in the city. They haven’t seen their families in years. Their only reward - to send money back home. Without accounts at banks, their only option is to use money remittance shops.

Cebuana Lhuillier wanted to be the preferred money remittance service for these Filipino workers.

The idea: Money transfers as reliable as delivering it yourself.

We selected customers who were regularly remitting money to their families in the Philippines. Then secretly contacted them and flew them home to personally hand their money to surprised family members at the Cebuana branch.

Having been apart for years, this made for a very emotional moment and a powerful demonstration of our idea. We then edited the actual footage into a series of TV commercials.

Inside the store, false walls and pillars were constructed to hide six strategically-positioned cameramen. Once the receiving family member entered the store to collect their money, the cameras started rolling.

We selected the best re-meets, and edited the footage into TV commercials and YouTube films. Viewers fell in love with the families onscreen, so we revealed their stories through Behind-the-Scenes interviews.

Cebuana Lhuillier became the most talked-about remittance service in social networking sites for weeks.

Just two months after the campaign, Cebuana remittances increased by a sizeable 18%.