The City of Brotherly Love is hoping to boost tourism this year with an ad effort supported by some big out-of-home media buys this winter.
The effort, "With Love, Philadelphia XOXO," via by the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation, also includes a consumer-engagement program to get people to come up with text for billboard advertising. The campaign launches this week with dominations in New York City and Washington, D.C., train stations, and with advertising on the CNN Airport Network.
A 30-second TV spot is running for 12 weeks in airports in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Washington, D.C., and Virginia. The marketing organization says it is the first advertiser to select individual airports through the CNN airport network. The spot will also play in 5,500 New York City taxicabs from Feb. 28 through March 30.
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In addition, New York City's ABC affiliate will run a half-hour special called "Destination Philadelphia" on March 12 and 13, making Philadelphia the first U.S. destination to do such a program. The special will be paired with print ads in magazines and newspapers, on billboards, in transit stations and online.
The tourism agency will take over New York's Pennsylvania Station, which gets some six million commuters a month -- with "With Love, Philadelphia"-themed ads to run simultaneously on 225 Amtrak-level advertising displays, including posters, column wraps, banners, kiosk dioramas and a stair riser. Washington, D.C.'s Union Station will get the same treatment in March. The campaign will include onboard posters on Amtrak and Acela trains and advertorials in Arrive magazine.
The agency is also doing joint marketing efforts with Philadelphia destinations like the Philadelphia Museum of Art, National Constitution Center, and the month-long Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts this spring.
Philadelphia's tourism organization is also getting behind Philly's National Hockey League team, the Flyers. Cara Schneider, an agency spokesperson, says the effort is aimed at a major tourism feeder market for the city: Toronto.
The agency has launched a Flyers contest at www.visitphilly.com/ hockey, called "The Ultimate Flyers VIP Sports Experience," dangling two round-trip tickets from Toronto, deluxe accommodations at a Center City hotel, Flyers merchandise, a private tour of the Wells Fargo Center and a pair of seats to the March 3 game against the Toronto Maple Leafs.
"One of the French Canadian Flyers taped a video inviting people to sign up," says Schneider. The group also held PIFA press events in New York, Toronto and Montreal.
I think this is great work. It seems like it sort of revives the nostalgic/romantic notions of travel...
It wasn't mentioned in the article, but I suspect the campaign was inspired by Steven Powers' great "Love Letter" mural project. http://www.aloveletterforyou.com/