Qantas is an iconic Australian brand. The ‘flying kangaroo’ is embedded in our culture’s DNA. It is an Australian story like no other, transporting over 50 million passengers a year, but it has never been told from the inside out.

Go ‘below the wing’ to see what really happens behind the scenes as Qantas welcomes you aboard like never before.

We started with the above promo lines to anchor the creative idea.

This gave birth to Ready For Take-Off, an 8 x 30 minute TV and cross-platform factual entertainment series to be aired on the biggest free to air network in prime-time and across paid, owned and earned assets.

RFTO CAST REAL QANTAS STAFF as key characters to narrate and feature in strong editorial stories. Characters would need to be diverse – the pilot, baggage handler, cabin crew and customers – and their stories celebrated.

18 full time production staff were hired, four Qantas staff allocated, multiple experts assigned, agency media, strategy and activation teams were deployed to deliver pre-Christmas.

Film crews shot in all major Australian capital cities, with Qantas staff followed internationally to Dallas, Dubai, Indonesia and London.

Total production period: 29 weeks (18/05/15 – 16/11/15) for casting, pre-production, shooting, post-production and delivery.

Episode 1-4: 30/10/15 Friday 8pm.

Episode 5-8: 2/12/15-16/12/15 Performance success and audience growth saw RFTO moved by programming to 7.30pm Wednesday.

Qantas owned social and media assets were used pre broadcast to drive awareness. All episodes were live produced on owned social assets with Periscope Q&A post broadcast.

The scale of RFTO cannot be overstated. It’s the largest branded entertainment project undertaken and delivered in Australia. In addition to traditional media coverage, more than 10 social platforms owned and network assets were used for content delivery.

RFTO is a true ratings success story, with the series reaching a total of 6.2 million (Source ETAM Analyzer). This is an outstanding figure in the Australian TV marketplace.

Episode 3 won the timeslot, beating Modern Family.

Episode 7 peaked at 1,000,000 @ 7.30pm 25-54.

TV audience, PR, social listening and staff and customer surveys saw RFTO over deliver on all metrics.

- 95% surveyed (n1600) said they would watch RFTO again.

- + 90% lift in social positive sentiment across the series. 5,800 active mentions p/w and 58,000 across the series doubled interactions.

- 58% were more likely to fly with Qantas after watching the show.

- Qantas dominated competitor’s social with a 61% share of mentions compared to Emirates at 17.2% and the rest not even close across the broadcast period.

- RFTO stretched the brand in 10/14 key personality areas.

- Staff satisfaction increased when RFTO aired.

- RFTO diversified revenues with content monetisation digital inventory and international tape.