When the South Carolina Parks Recreation & Tourism department wanted to boost tourism, they looked to what appears on the surface not to be the best candidate: Chicago. So why the Windy City?
Rawle Murdy, who handled a media buy for a month-long campaign, selected Chicago as the target market because its airport has direct flights to all of South Carolina’s airports.
A guerilla campaign in four Chicago parking garages showcased South Carolina as a fast, warm getaway option for Chicago residents schlepping through the city in single-degree temperatures, say tourism officials.
Each garage was wrapped with warm, inviting, and surprisingly realistic messaging telling residents that it’s “Time to thaw.”
Stairwells and escalators led commuters to a bikini-clad woman sunbathing on a beach; garage pillars morphed into golf tees; “South Carolina is calling,” read phone kiosks fitted with conch shells as phones; and bathroom hand dryers read, “press button for warm South Carolina breezes.”
The Bounce Agency created the campaign, which drove commuters to the “Time to Thaw” Web site.
“South Carolina’s Department of Parks, Recreation & Tourism has outdone itself with a series of tantalizing outdoor ad installations that started going up in downtown Chicago last week and will remain in place through mid-March,†wrote Chicago Sun-Times columnist Lewis Lazare, who added:
“Over the years, warm weather vacation destinations have learned a smart little trick about how to market to Chicagoans: Hit us with an oh-so-inviting advertising blitz right when we are battling subzero wind chills, blizzards, ice, sleet and everything else that makes winter in the Windy City so dreary.â€
Will this campaign increase tourism to South Carolina, or will Chicagoans be left cold by it? It’s too early to tell.
Report by David Wilkening
