Ornge

The Ontario Air Ambulance service – the distinctive orange helicopter that moves critically ill or injured people from an accident scene to the hospital or from rural hospitals to urban centres – needed to communicate its recent rebranding to Ornge.

Ontario is one of the few jurisdictions in North America with this type of service, and because it’s publicly funded and vulnerable to the economic pressures of government budgets, Taxi needed to highlight the rebranding as well as raise the service’s profile to ensure public support.

The creative sprung from a tragic insight that in travelling the highways of the province, a driver can encounter roadside shrines. Taxi decided to portray the importance of the service by focusing on these scenarios with the tagline, “Propelling Life.”

TV was the primary medium in the multimedia campaign. A TV spot shows the wind blowing away makeshift shrines of flowers, teddy bears and photos. The copy reads: “Last year, 18,007 lives were saved with help from above.” A shot of the helicopter comes into focus. Newspaper ads were developed as well as ambient media placed in doctors’ offices and on transit systems.

The campaign has helped to reinforce the human value of this service, and won a Bronze Lion at Cannes.