Sunshine Matters

Building on the $2.5 million campaign that began on May 15, today VISIT FLORIDA launched Phase 2 of an aggressive advertising campaign to support the summer travel season.  This $7.15 million campaign, funded through the Governors Office from the $25 million received by the State from BP, will generate over 480 million impressions in the next 3 weeks.

The campaign includes a combination of broadcast television, radio, newspaper and cable television advertising and targets the traditional summer feeder markets of Atlanta, Birmingham, Charlotte, Dallas, Houston, Raleigh and St. Louis, plus the 17 key regional markets of Albany, Augusta, Austin, Baton Rouge, Chattanooga, Columbus, Greenville, Jackson, Knoxville, Lexington, Little Rock, Macon, Memphis, Montgomery, Nashville, New Orleans and Shreveport.  Major metro markets that provide significant levels of summer travel to Florida – such as Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Detroit, Cleveland, Baltimore and New York – will be added, as well as a significant national cable television buy.

The creative messaging for the campaign will continue to be fluid as the actual environmental impacts from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill become more apparent.  VISIT FLORIDA pulled our “Coast is Clear” advertising messages yesterday and, beginning today, our new messaging “Need to Know” began airing on television and radio.

The call to action on all advertising continues to direct consumers to the Florida Live platform on www.VISITFLORIDA.com where travelers can see real-time updates from individual destinations around the state, live webcams and recently uploaded photos of real people enjoying real Florida right now. This week an exciting new feature was added to Florida Live with the addition of Florida Live Daily Video Updates.  The goal of Florida Live is to provide travelers with real-time information from trusted sources so that they can continue to plan their Florida vacations with confidence.

Additionally, VISIT FLORIDA and the Florida Restaurant & Lodging Association are teaming up to enhance the promotion of great travel deals to the state this summer.  These deals will be highlighted in advertising and will be available on www.VISITFLORIDA.com, www.FRLA.org and on the VISIT FLORIDA and Share a Little Sunshine pages on Facebook.