WestJet Airline Ltd's marketing team is again tugging at the nation's heartstrings with a Father's Day video showing how the airline teamed up with Ronald McDonald House Charities Canada to reunite a Saskatoon father with his sick son in an Edmonton hospital.
In December, the Calgary-based airline performed a marketing miracle with its Christmas video, which showed the airline surprising travellers at their arrival at the Calgary airport with the presents they wished for hours earlier. The video went viral, receiving more than 35 million views.
By Thursday, 'Father's Day Tribute' - posted Tuesday - was at more than 113,000 hits and climbing fast.
The video posted on YouTube tells the story of how a WestJet employee Medel Villena volunteered to replace Saskatoon father Marc Grimard at work so that he could be flown free of charge by WestJet to spend a week with his family.
'Thanks to our partners at WestJet we are about to embark on a remarkable journey, a chance to support one of our families in a way that we have never supported a family before,' Cathy Loblaw, CEO of Ronald McDonald House Charities Canada, says in the video.
Marc's four-year-old son Joel suffers from a congenital heart condition and has spent most of his life at Ronald McDonald House Northern Alberta with his mother Angela while he receives treatment at the Stollery Children's Hospital. Marc stays in Saskatoon, with his other seven-year-old son Mathieu, working to support his family.
The video captures how WestJetter Medel trains to do Marc's job as a Saskatoon transit worker and then surprises the father at his workplace with plane tickets and news that he has five days off for a family reunion.
'As a dad to be able to be close to your sick child - especially when they are away from home - as a parent there is nothing more important,' said Marc. 'I don't have the words to say how grateful I am.'
WestJet, which has donated 575 flights to Ronald McDonald House since 2007, has promised to donate one more flight for every 100,000 views to a maximum of 500,000 - potentially reuniting five more families.
Now watch WestJet's Christmas Miracle
Post By http://business.financialpost.com/2014/06/05/westjet-airlines-ltd-fathers-day-video/
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