Background and context:

Queensland’s propensity for natural disasters is unparalleled – 80 severe weather events in the last decade alone, incurring over $16B in recovery costs. Over 134,000 homes were damaged in 2020 alone3,4.

Despite the frequency of events, Queensland follows the larger Australian model of 97% recovery to 3% resilience1.

As a result of constant rebuilds, insurance premiums in Queensland are double that of the rest of the country and premiums have increased more rapidly (67% vs. 16%)5. And in a state defined by increasingly expensive insurance costs, Suncorp is seen as particularly expensive. In reality, the brand is just particularly comprehensive. But as consumer confidence spiralled in the wake of the pandemic and resultant economic uncertainty, Suncorp was losing more customers to budget competitors than it was gaining, and Suncorp’s market share in home insurance had slipped 8% year-on-year6.

Creative challenge:

How can Suncorp overcome Queensland’s bias for recovery to transform resilience into preferred natural disaster strategy, reversing years of societal apathy as well as their own business declines?

Solution:

To get off the ‘disaster-recovery’ treadmill and set Queenslanders on a path to genuine resilience, we showed them what it takes for a home to be resilient to life up north, as well as how far their own homes were from this standard.

Execution:

One House To Save Many - the world’s first home designed, scientifically tested, built to withstand severe weather events; fire, flood and cyclone.

To complement Suncorp’s expertise in insurance and disaster impacts, we gathered some of Australia’s leading minds on natural hazards, home resilience, environmental and architectural best practice. This included experts from James Cook University, the CSIRO, and Room 11 Architects.

At every stage, from home resilience testing to product design to PR, we sought to draw attention to the distance between current building codes in Queensland homes today and what’s required to be truly resilient, while also highlighting the benefits of a more prepared Queensland.

•In our dedicated testing units, at the CSIRO-operated Bushfire Burnover Facility and James Cook University Cyclone Testing Station, we exposed prototypes of One House to a series of simulation tests to understand what aspects of the house would fail, and what would be resistant to fires, flooding, and cyclones.

•To maximize the campaign impact and reach, we launched a 23-minute documentary on primetime TV with Network 9, supported through a mass media PR push including across national programs such as A Current Affair and The Today Show.

•A coordinated digital, social, and ATL media campaign that directed viewers to the interactive One House hub where they could find open-source designs, apply the One House innovations to specific disaster scenarios, and access plans to incorporate resilience into their own homes.

•Based on the results of the experiment, Suncorp developed an Australia-wide insurance industry first product innovation called ‘Build it Back Better’, which rebuilds homes damaged in insurable severe events with additional resilient materials discovered in One House testing. And they made it available to every home insurance customer.