This case study demonstrates how advertising has educated the public on the causes of fire and fire safety behaviour, raised awareness of safety practices, effected significant change in habitual behaviour, and in turn reduced fatalities and injuries. Human handprints strewn across walls became the creative basis of the campaign across TV, radio, press, outdoor and sponsorship. The communication strategy executed strategic and integrated campaign planning and showed extraordinary results, including a 14% decrease in the total number of household fires year on year, a 12% decrease of overall fire injuries year on year. As a direct result of the advertising 60% of respondents were influenced to take practical preventative action.

In an integrated campaign, TV was effective in facilitating the targeting of each individual fire safety message to a specific audience through extensive programme research and day-part analysis. For example, the chip pan safety message was up-weighted at dinner time and late at night to target those returning hungry from pubs and clubs and the “check your smoke alarm battery message” was placed in breaks adjacent to local news bulletins which would inevitably cover any fire-related tragedies and Fire Brigade successes over the key weekend period. The television activity was planned to provide a constant presence throughout the high-risk period.

Within the mix, the performance of the TV advertising achieved 83% recall and was key in delivering awareness of the issues involved and changing consumer behaviour in the home. This paper demonstrated how the collaboration between media and creative can be critical to a TV campaign.

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