Australia’s climate can be tough. Suncorp and Leo Australia have been building Australia’s resilience to it since 2021, with practical innovations, education and emotional understanding.
Their new commercial, The Tale of Two Queenslands, combines education and emotional understanding. It focuses on the uniquely dual nature of life in Queensland, an Australian state defined equally by natural beauty and extreme weather. The campaign, Resilience Never Rests, brings to life the reality of Queensland’s weather that locals know well – where paradise and volatility co-exist and can shift in an instant. It highlights the actions Queenslanders can take to prepare for these extremes, positioning resilience not as a reaction to disaster, but as the thread that helps Queenslanders move confidently between two realities.
Production for the hero commercial was led by Scoundrel and the film was shot entirely in-camera by UK director, Sam Brown. The storybook‑style stage play presents the volatility of Queensland’s climate imagined through the eyes of a young girl as she embarks on her journey home, resilient to the extremes of the sunshine state. The approach avoids the category’s reliance on disaster tropes and creates something visually arresting and unexpected.
Mim Haysom, CMO and executive general manager brand & customer experience, Suncorp, stated, “Queenslanders don’t experience nature in one way; they live with both its beauty and its risk, and therefore resilience is a necessary way of life. As Queensland’s largest insurer, proudly based here for over 100 years, no one understands better than Suncorp that Queenslanders don’t simply switch resilience on when disaster strikes, they need to build, prepare, and recover, and we are beside them for every step of that journey.
Tim Woolford, ECD at Leo Australia, added, “This campaign strikes a chord because of its truth – Queensland is beautiful, but living there has its challenges. This paradox is part of the defining experience of being a Queenslander. By holding both realities in the same frame, the work reflects what people experience every day. With Suncorp being a Queensland insurer, from Queensland, this was so important to represent.
“This has been such a wonderful, rewarding project to be a part of. There is so much care in every frame in this film, and collaborating with Sam and his team on this has been a career highlight.”
The platform continues to build on Suncorp’s long‑standing investment in resilience. This includes initiatives such as One House (2021), that demonstrated how homes can be designed to better withstand natural hazards; Resilience Road (2022), that focused on upgrading homes in a single street in Rockhampton to demonstrate practical renovations; If Your Home Could Talk (2023), aimed at protecting homes from extreme weather in South East Queensland. and Haven (2025), Suncorp’s data‑led platform that turns complex risk information into clear, practical steps, tailored to every home in Australia.
The Tale of Two Queenslands will launch in May, rolling out nationwide across TVC, online video, out‑of‑home, social, and digital.
Credits:
Client: Suncorp
EGM Brand and Customer Experience: Mim Haysom
Head of Brand and Content: Rapthi Thanapalasingam
Travis Hughes: Marketing Manager
Marketing Lead: Sally Frank
Agencies: LEO & Publicis Production
Chief Executive Officer: Clare Pickens
Chief Creative Officer: Andy Fergusson
Executive Creative Director: Tim Woolford
Creative Director: Stacey Karayannis
Associate Creative Director: Rosie Stone
Senior Art Director: Tim Yates
Chief Client Partner: Amanda Wheeler
Group Business Director: Alex Barkworth
Senior Business Manager: Ali Jeffrey
Group Strategy Director: Mitch Hunter
National Director of Production: Michael Demosthenous
Senior Producer: Leigh Woodhams
Production Company: SCOUNDREL
Director: Sam Brown
Producer: Polly Ruskin
Co-Founder & Executive Producer: Adrian Shapiro
DOP: Aaron McLisky
Herman Lampen: Production Designer
Post-Production: ARC
Editor: Lucas Baynes
Music & Sound: Studio Tonic
Sound Designer: Simon Lister
Composer: Emma Greenhill @ Studio Tonic
Chief Executive Producer: Emma Duncan
Executive Producer: Laura-Leigh Le Brocque
Music Director: Ramesh Sathiah
VO Artist: Phoebe Taylor
Media Strategy: OMD
Media Implementation: Open Era
