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How It All Began
Every agency pitches business the same way:
Hire a guy in a black Armani suit to gather research and consumer awareness information, bring it back to the creative folks with their baggy clothes and trucker caps, create outrageous concepts, hop on a plane with a big portfolio case, get a room in the best hotel in town, show up the next day at the presentation and show the client your brilliant solutions.
We decided to do things a little differently:
Because we already knew that at least 87% of Mississippi Gulf Coast visitors drove from no more than 400 miles away, we decided to do the same thing – except of course, from much farther. So our creative team crammed their layout pads, marker collections, thesauruses, laptops, printers, scanners, digi-cams, lucky brainstorming T-shirts, about 100 reams of paper, and a whole bunch of junk food and Tums® into an RV and drove from Miami, Florida to Mississippi’s Gulf Coast.
And because we know the best way to get consumer insight is to talk to them when they’re the most comfortable, we unfurled our camper’s awning in each RV Park we visited, set out a big cooler of beer, and sat around with a couple guitars and a bag of harmonicas making music and chatting with people who stopped by.
We learned things about Mississippi Gulf Coast visitation we never would have known otherwise. Things we never would have guessed or theorized. Most importantly, we created a strategically compelling campaign that will not only attract new visitors but will increase the frequency of visits from existing customers. (If we win the account – that is).
Plus, we had a great adventure.
Bruce Turkel (Owner, Executive Creative Director and Blues Harmonicist)
Danny Turkel (Son and Gopher Extraordinaire)
Soren Thielemann (Newly-Hitched Nordic Art Director Guy)
Greg Wheeler (Writer Guy)
Cesár Cintron (Techy Web Guru All Things Computerish Guy)
