• by Tanya Gazdik , December 14, 2017

Brand USA aims to assist and inspire international visitors via creative executions at the Atlanta airport.

The destination-marketing organization for the United States partnered with the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau, and Georgia Tourism for the “Market the Welcome” program to guide travelers through the international arrival process at the world’s busiest airport. The program also aims to inspire guests to visit and experience the greater Atlanta region and the State of Georgia, according to the organization. 

The airport is the fifth in the U.S. to implement the program. Each airport that has the “Market the Welcome” campaign in place in its international arrivals area features high-impact, inspirational imagery and welcoming language customized to the local and regional tourism market. 

At the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, there are 29 large panels across 14 gates in Terminal F with welcoming messages in multiple languages, including Korean, Portuguese, Spanish, German and simplified Chinese, in addition to English.  

The other airports that have implemented the program are Miami International Airport, Chicago O'Hare International Airport, Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport and Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport.

“We have an ideal opportunity to extend our hospitality, and thank our guests for choosing the USA for their travel experiences,” said Christopher L. Thompson, Brand USA president and CEO, in a release. “The Atlanta airport presents great possibilities for conveying our welcome to international visitors and inviting them to discover the nearly limitless number of authentic travel experiences that the USA offers.”

The facility has been the world’s busiest airport for 19 consecutive years. More than 104 million passengers navigated through the airport in 2016, which represented a 2.6% increase over the previous year’s numbers. Travelers who fly into Atlanta are within a two-hour flight of 80% of the U.S. population.

In 2016, the United States welcomed 75.6 million international visitors, according to the National Travel and Tourism Office, a division of the U.S. Department of Commerce. This level of international arrivals is the second-highest ever. According to NTTO, from January through August 2017, international visitors who came to the United States have spent nearly $168 billion, an increase of 3.2% over figures from the same period in 2016. 

Overall, in 2016 international visitors spent nearly $245 billion in the United States, which topped the world list in global tourism receipts and made up approximately 16.9% of all world traveler spending. Travel and tourism represented 33% of all U.S. services exports and 11% of all U.S. exports in 2016. The U.S. trade surplus in travel and tourism was $89.3 billion in 2016.

Brand USA, the destination marketing organization for the United States, was established by the Travel Promotion Act as the nation's first public-private partnership to promote the United States as a premier travel destination and to communicate U.S. travel policies and procedures to worldwide travelers. The organization’s mission is to increase international visitation to the USA in order to fuel the U.S. economy and enhance the image of the United States worldwide.