Tourism Australia Launches Luhrmann's Transformation Campaign

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. October 14, 2008

OCTOBER 9, 2008. Tourism Australia and the internationally renowned film-maker Baz Luhrmann and his team have created a new sophisticated destination campaign to make Australia the 'must visit' destination for travelers around the world.

Tourism Australia Managing Director Geoff Buckley said the unique opportunity created by the production of Luhrmann's epic film Australia was one the organization could not let pass.

"We knew that this huge film would create a wave of publicity that would put the country in the spotlight around the globe," he said. "And we found that the film's story had a remarkable resonance for what we do marketing the country as a travel destination.

"The challenge was always going to be how to ride the power of the film, but with a stand-alone and self-reliant tourism campaign. Getting Baz Luhrmann and his team on board to make that campaign was simply the best result we could hope for."

Nick Baker, Executive General Manager Marketing for Tourism Australia said the campaign was unlike any other tourism campaign. "It's cinematic in style, is based on a story with a beginning, middle and end, is sophisticated and highly emotive," he said. "It is not the traditional slide-show of pretty pictures of places and people.

"The idea stems from Baz's film, which tells the story of Nicole Kidman's character, Lady Sarah Ashley, who has lost her sense of self but who finds adventure, romance and her true self when she comes to Australia.

"We've made that core storyline into two short-film-like stories of contemporary people who are stressed and disconnected from their loved ones and their true selves, and who find their center and their release in Australia."

Mr Baker said the term 'walkabout' had been adopted in the campaign as a uniquely Australian way of describing what holidays should be - a time of release, joy, discovery and reconnection with our loved ones and our real selves.

"Walkabout also enabled us to bring our Indigenous culture into the heart of the story, with the young Aboriginal actor, Brandon Walters who features in the film Australia, inviting our potential travelers to come 'Walkabout' in Australia."

Mr Buckley said the campaign would run in all of Tourism Australia's 22 major markets around the world from October 2008 until mid 2009. The campaign will run in cinema, television, print and online, commencing in the UK on the 8th October.

The campaign will commence in the USA in print and online from November 2008 and on television in January 2009. Michelle Gysberts, Vice President of the Americas region said that this was a strategic decision based on the current economic and political climate in the USA.

"With the national election and the credit crunch understandably occupying the minds of American consumers at this time, we made the decision to hold back the bulk of our brand advertising spend until early next year. We also wanted to wait until after 20th Century Fox's movie campaign. This way Australia is top of mind for American consumers from October right through to March 2009," said Ms Gysberts.

The success of the campaign will be measured through Tourism Australia's brand tracking research, through responses to the call to action of www.australia.com and through more specific responses to those instances where the campaign runs cooperatively with a direct product offering.

The ads are available to view on www.australia.com

CAMPAIGN FACTS

o The Australian writer, producer and director Baz Luhrmann, and his Bazmark production team, have produced a special destination campaign for Tourism Australia.

o The two campaign cinema/TV spots were conceived by Baz Luhrmann and his team and directed by Bruce Hunt, four-time Director of the Year in Australia for his commercial work. They were produced by Bazmark in association with award winning commercials production company Revolver.

o The two spots feature an all Australian cast and were shot on location in north Western Australia and on sound stages at Fox Studios Australia in Sydney.

o As an extension to the Bazmark TV/cinema campaign, print and online ads were produced by DDB Worldwide. There are eleven different print versions - shot in every State and Territory.

o The campaign will run in all Tourism Australia's major markets around the world from October 2008 until mid 2009.

o It is a special campaign that's being made to take advantage of a special opportunity and to address the difficult times that tourism faces globally.

o Tourism Australia's objective from this campaign is that it will ensure Australia reaches its forecast growth rate of 3.2 percent in international arrivals in 2009.

o The campaign was conceived by Luhrmann to be completely stand-alone however Tourism Australia has also entered into a promotional partnership with Twentieth Century Fox to leverage Baz Luhrmann's new epic film Australia, starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman.

o Combined, these two projects represent the bulk, but not the whole, of Tourism Australia's marketing for 08/09.

o Tourism Australia is investing around $40 million in the ad campaign and around

$10 million on promotional opportunities around the movie.