GIO planted its red safety mat where Sydney accidents are waiting to happen

GIO, the Suncorp-owned insurer, wanted to extend its new long-term brand platform beyond commercials, keeping the mat as the symbol of protection from life's everyday mishaps.

Build the brand's TV device at life size: plant the red safety mat at real Sydney spots where everyday mishaps look about to happen.

Three outdoor installations blended into their surroundings — a power pole crashing through a home, a nose-to-tail collision taking over the bridge on Greystanes Road, and would-be thieves scaling an apartment block — live across Sydney for the rest of September 2026, with media by WPP Media OpenEra and production by Publicis Production.

No results figures were reported. The installations carried the platform's promise of protection into physical environments and extended the launch campaign through September.

In September 2026, GIO extended its 'Great Insurance, Obviously' campaign with a series of outdoor installations that placed the brand's signature red safety mat in locations where everyday mishaps are likely to occur. The work was created by Leo Australia for the Suncorp-owned insurer.

The campaign consisted of three installations: a power pole crashing through a home, a nose-to-tail collision, and would-be thieves scaling an apartment block. Each was designed to blend into its surroundings, illustrating how an accident requiring insurance could occur — with the red mat, as on TV, materialising to soften the impact.

The OOH work extended the creative idea introduced in the platform's launch earlier in 2026, which positioned the mat as a symbol of protection from life's everyday mishaps. Suncorp Group's EGM brand and customer experience Mim Haysom said the goal was to take the platform into the real world and bring the promise of protection to life in a way 'unmistakably GIO'; Leo Australia ECD Tim Woolford framed the mat as the anchor of a distinctive long-term brand platform.

The campaign ran across Sydney for the rest of September 2026, with media by WPP Media OpenEra and production by Publicis Production.

The brand took its advertising's central prop out of the commercial and rebuilt it at street scale, where passers-by supply the 'before' half of the story.

Each installation dramatised a specific claim category — property damage, collision, theft — without writing a word of copy about cover.

It shows a platform thinking beyond its launch film: the mat had to work as a physical brand asset, not just an edit-suite device.

A distinctive brand asset earns its keep when it can leave the screen — building the metaphor at real scale tests whether the device is genuinely ownable.

The installations were live across Sydney for the remainder of September 2026 as an extension of the platform launched earlier that year.