The Campaign

We were asked to create a way to get consumers to prioritise their family’s eye health. Through research we found that many children have a vision issue, and that many of these issues go unidentified, causing development and learning issues in a large volume of children across Australia. We looked to engage families through the gatekeeper of family health, mums and offer them a tool which could screen the eyes of their own child. We developed a series of children’s vision screenings with the Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences at the University of Melbourne. To ensure the screenings (and their required tools) are adopted by parents and kids, we approached author/illustrator Kevin Waldron to create a story that could easily hide the screening requirements while keeping kids happy and engaged. We then turned this into a tablet app, allowing parents to screen their child's vision as they read to them. Since launch, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of children’s eye tests appointments. Beyond that we have identified eye health issues that had previously been undetected and helped improve these children’s performance at school.

The Brief

Campaign goals included: - Regain OPSMs market leadership in eye health - Engage the gate keeper of family health, mums, encourage and empower them to prioritise eye health for the whole family. - Drive an uplift in the volume of eye tests for OPSM's network. - Create a national campaign which offers equal support and across across Australia. - Started with a limited scope - now a fully integrated campaign (TV, digital, direct and store presence) - Make eye screenings engaging and fun for children

Creative Execution

Penny the pirate follows the journey of a young girl as she tries to become captain of the mighty pickle. She has to plunder treasure, read the captain’s log and spot sails in the distance to prove she’s a worthy leader of this brutish bunch of pirates. With the help of children’s author illustrator Kevin Waldron and the Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences at the University of Melbourne this story took clinical eye tests and turned them into an illustrated children’s storybook app and help parents get a better understanding of their child’s eye health.

The app reached number 1 in the Health and Fitness chart. There has been a significant increase in eye test appointments, particularly for children and the business has rolled Penny the Pirate out across its store network in Australia and New Zealand.

The app was targeted towards Mums, as the gatekeeper of family eye health. We created a story which parents could read to their child and screen their vision at the same time. They could then check their results and were driven to existing OPSM channels if an eye test or further help were needed. We knew Mums rely on a network of friends for parenting recommendations and like the act of sharing and passing on relevant information. When the story was completed mums were encouraged to share it and the kit with friends through our pass-it-on program. We partnered with Mummy Blogger social networks and these mothers became advocates for the brand and project, posting reviews and sharing the project online.