We knew the holidays were going to be a tough time for these families who had lost everything in the fire. So we wanted to bring some Christmas magic to the town of Fort McMurray.

The idea was to throw a huge festive party that gave families the chance to create new memories: take family portraits, create new stockings, sing and dance with friends. The biggest surprise of all was saved for last. As the families gathered around a huge Christmas tree and sang carols, a magical gift drop happened over their heads. Hundreds of personalized gift boxes drifted to the ground with parachutes. In each gift, was an ornament with the family's photo (taken just that night at the event) as well as round trip airplane tickets for the whole family. It was a magical moment that literally drew gasps of amazement from the crowd, and the tears flowed.

The event was a massive undertaking as we built a 5000 square foot tent on a golf course in the remote northern town. The tent was converted into a visually stunning Winter Wonderland, packed with fun activities. Canadian superstar Johnny Reid amazed the crowd with a surprise concert. A magical gift drop experience gave every family free flights to help them travel to see family and friends.

A wide variety of social content was deployed on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram, with a paid media plan to support. The WestJet blog hosted a content hub where viewers could engage in over 10 unique pieces of content, including stories of WestJetters giving personal items to the families, to help get them back on their feet.

The story was unavoidable on launch day and for several days after, as it dominated media and social conversations.

• The campaign generated 4.8 billion media impressions

• 10 million views:Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

• hero video was watched in over 215 countries.

• 690 online articles.

• 20 print articles.

• 371 radio / tv appearances, including a live segment on Ellen that captured 7 million viewers.

• Sales via social media increased 400%

• Over $1MM in direct sales from guests who viewed content on the hub.

• The hashtag #WestJetChristmas was used nearly 12,000 times

• 19 live media interviews

• International social chatter increased from previous years, primarily due to targeted social posts in the UK and US media engagement.

• But the most important result of all was reinforcing, once again, that WestJet’s positive culture of caring is something worth sharing

At the heart of this idea is a desire to continue to demonstrate how WestJet truly lives up to its brand promise: "Owners Care." Recognizing that the Fort McMurray wildfires were the biggest media story of the year, it was one of the most rare of opportunities, where CSR / reputation building align perfectly with not only corporate values, but also business objectives. Earning media interest and starting a conversation was at the core of this campaign.

While the core creative idea was to create a magical evening for those who needed it most, the overall strategy was focused on attracting interest and starting a conversation with both the media and in social, and to convert that conversation into revenue. The Fort McMurray wildfires were the #1 news story in Canada in 2016, so we knew media interest would be rampant. Families who attended gave over 19 high visibility media interviews.

As for social, we leveraged the event to capture a wide range of content that could be used across all of WestJet's channels. This content was then used to re-target consumers who engaged with us during the campaign to drive sales. Social influencers were also used to drive conversations in our key international markets: the US and the UK.

WestJet is known as the airline that lives its brand promise: "Owners Care." In 2016 the biggest media story of the year was the devastating wildfires in Fort McMurray, Alberta. As a proud Alberta company, we knew we needed to step up and help. This begin right away, as we offered free rescue flights to thousands of stranded victims. But as the holidays rolled around, and it was time to launch our annual Christmas campaign, we knew we had to use our platform to help those who were still in need.

We had an opportunity to break through the clutter of holiday brand activations and tell a story we knew the media and the public would love to share.

This situation offered the perfect platform to demonstrate how we truly the live Owners Care promise, while telling a story we knew the media would be interested in.