DoT signs $1m contract with creative agency
(CNS): The Cayman Islands Department of Tourism has signed a contract worth almost US$1 million with a new branding and creative agency to help with advertising in the US market. Following a competitive tender, The Richards Group, which is based in Texas, won the bid to help the department continue its success in growing its market share of visitors to the Caribbean. The agency joins Coyne PR, which won the bid to remain the DoT’s public relations agency of record, but officials said they were unable to disclose the contract value as the deal was still being finalised.
The investment the DoT has been making in promotion and branding has been paying off, demonstrated last week by news of more recording-breaking arrival numbers, with stay-over visitors exceeding all expectations. The department said the two new contracts would help continued growth in arrivals and awareness in the US leisure and business travel markets, which remains a key priority.
“The Cayman Islands is tasked by the government to stand out in the minds of potential travellers as the best choice for a Caribbean vacation and, through the destination marketing plan, convert this awareness to confirmed bookings,” DoT Director Rosa Harris said in a press release from the department announcing the latest contracts.
“By working with innovative agencies such as Coyne PR and The Richards Group, we aim to be bold in our communications and advertising as the Department of Tourism moves the Cayman Islands tourism business toward new initiatives that will achieve positive results.”
Rob VanGorden, principal at The Richards Group, said they were proud to be a small part of Caymankind. “We learned a lot during the past few months. Along with the bluest waters and the most luxurious white sand beaches – a must for any bucket list – the Cayman Islands has the most diverse, friendly and positive people on earth,” he said.
Jennifer Kamienski, executive vice president for Coyne Public Relations, which has been working with DoT for three years, said they were honoured to continue representing the Cayman Islands.
“Our passion for the destination naturally fuels our creative thinking for compelling, lifestyle-driven programming that brings the Cayman Islands into the next chapter of its rich tourism history. We look forward to contributing to the ongoing growth and success of the Cayman Islands for many years to come,” she added.
Each country has its national costume. A folk costume expresses an identity through costume, which is usually associated with a geographic area or a period of time in history.
Does Cayman have one? If so, I’ve never seen it.
That is because it is a cultural vacuum.
Spend less on cleaning up the smelly enormous Sargassum mess.
That would promote Tourism more than $1 mil for colourful Ads and Videos of ‘pristine beaches’.
. . . the smell is horendous in EE and NS.
I see one of the very faces of the campaign with a long list of CaymanKind charges in the Summary Court today.
no Cayman no Cry
How about going with “Fly-over state middle management, come to the Caymans where you can pay first class prices for third rate destination”. At least it would be honest.
LOL!!!!!!
You need to come out of your basement onc in a while.
He won’t let me out…
Stay in there with your sisters and be quiet.
Was there a tender?
No-one at the Lodge wanted the gig, so there might have been.
better than spending it on the rich…our at south sound…..just so they can walk their dogs!… why we aint seeing any boardwalks in prospect or dog city? ????????????
You people don’t deserve anything nice. Who wants to walk on a board-walk to look at your rundown home, overgrown yard, and trash + derelict vehicles along the side of the roads? Clean up your mess first.
Where is the ocean view in dog city?
I trust every one in this thread posting these very negative comments are doing so from afar…in a superior location?
Otherwise, y’all jus’ full a’ crap.
Jus’ sayin’.
– Who
#Whodatkind
Caymankind at its best. The comments are about the gulf between how Cayman sells itself as a tourist destination and reality.
Oh please, STFU. Ignoramous.
“Caymankind” has become a laughing stock. They better come up, for $1mil., with something different.
The DumpLand would be my suggestion.
I also wonder if advertising SMB without mentioning the nearby Dump constitutes misrepresentation or omission of a material fact?
Cayman is really too expensive for what it is. In high season, it’s >USD$40,000 for a week of higher-end Florida-grade accommodation for a family of four, plus flights, expensive meals, and entertainment. In tax-paying language, that’s over $80,000 in annual income blown on a forgettable one week family holiday. In the past, we benefited from some inelastic cost-blindness in that we hosted the doubleheader of being a “secret money haven”, but that allure should really have faded a decade or more ago. Given a world of superior tropical destination possibilities available at a fraction of our costs, I’m frankly surprised that our stay-over numbers are level, let alone rising. I’m skeptical that it’s sustainable at our price point even with the unintended benefit from the tragic calamity of last season’s eastern hurricane destinations.
I know that when we are hosting guests from out-of-town (or the boss for dinner), as a general operating policy, we tidy the house, and put clean sheets on the bed and a fresh towel. DoT needs 2 observant OCD employees (or patriotic volunteers) with 20:20 vision to simply drive around in a car for one typical arrival day armed with a clipboard and a pen, and tasked with auditing the quality and neaten our tourism product. We spent millions on “Operation Sponge Bob” to lure young families to our shores, where the sidewalks can be log-jammed by a single family stroller within a couple hundred feet of Royal Watler terminal. Trees and poles in the middle of sidewalks. Random curbing to nowhere. It’s as if we weren’t expecting almost two million cruise guests per year?!? The only illumination on West Bay Road in our now “crime headline” Seven Mile Beach, is the eastern side without any pedestrian sidewalk. Driving in from the airport, arriving impressionable guests are lead through the abandoned burned-out car wreckage of Red Gate Road. Surely someone at DoT has the authority to tidy-up these logistical ironies and “beautify” our house? Plant some flowers, offer some shade or a bench, and generally debur our product, so we can all feel more ownership and pride…as if we are expecting company. Thanks. A Caymanian.
Don’t forget police cars obstructing the elderly in wheelchairs trying to walk by Margaritaville
If they are in wheelchairs they won’t be trying to walk anywhere.
Cayman soon be renamed “Everyman” cause that is what it looks like like everywhere you go nowadays. Welcome to Cayman where we don’t have much Caymanians but hell we got everybody else and their mother here!
Well A Million $s spent in this way is better than paying a Million $s on someone to put “stupid glue” on corals.
Where did they get this idea from anyhow. Sticking corals back together with Glue?
In an area that anchors are dropping on a daily basis?
Did someone just create their own life job?
It always amuses me the way DoT take credit for things that they had nothing to with. Part of the boom is simply the fallout from the region’s most destructive hurricane season in history. Simple fact of life – while other destinations are still recovering from the impact of four Category 4 and 5 hurricanes people are coming here. Another factor is obviously Trump’s decision to slam the door on further US tourism to Cuba.
The big test will be how many of these first-timers come back and wasting another $1million (plus the inevitable add-ons and over-runs) on promoting ‘Caymankind’ in the USA isn’t going to do much to help that. The place to hook the return visitors is on-island and bluntly DoT aren’t doing a very good job of that.
I have a bad feeling that many new-comers who are used to taking their vacations elsewhere are going to experience the chaos at ORIA, find out how over-priced everything is here then take a look at an ‘island paradise’ that resembles a construction site topped off by a stinking garbage dump and go home not only swearing ‘never again’ but passing that message on the friends and families.
Incidentally, in the middle of this ‘tourism boom’ can anyone explain to me why so many of the online booking sites are still able to offer room specials and plenty of availability at almost all the major hotels on Grand Cayman?
It’s clear from the thumbs downs here the ‘head in the sand’ syndrome still prevails on these islands.
Please, please, please, ditch the Caymankind….
According to Moses business is already booming so why do we need this? Sounds like we’re not being told the whole story here.
According to Moses come see what his end is now? your own Ants bite you the hardest!
???
Dude, do you live under a rock? Business is booming because DOT has consistently been promoting Cayman and needs to continue what has proven to be successful.
Business is booming because half of the Caribbean is closed, you stooge. TF is wrong with you?
There are other destinations they could have chosen to go to, but they chose Cayman.
The 2nd most expensive place to live and visit use your brain you duffus or are you just another ppm little B!#@%
Do you think Amazon stops their marketing efforts because it’s already successful? The whole story is that you strike while the iron’s hot!
Thank you 11:50. Finally someone that gets it.
11:50 And the place to start that process is on-island, which is where DoT are failing abysmally. The cornerstone of any successful tourism product is repeat custom – the people who not only come back on a regular basis but go home and tell their friends and relatives what a great vacation they’ve had.
Attracting new business may sound like the best way forward but it’s a two-edged sword. As has already been posted – if you pull in first-timers who then have a bad experience you’re effectively shooting yourself in the foot.
High profile PR campaigns in the USA may make good headlines but, as the saying goes, ‘the devil is in the detail’. If you do a hard sell on the place using silly phrases like, ‘the most diverse, friendly and positive people on earth’, and that’s not what new arrivals find you end up with tourists who are not just unhappy but feel they’ve been cheated, ripped off and lied to. That happened in the resort where I was working about 20 years ago and trust me it’s bad combination.
The bottom line on this is that if DoT are going to use the Richards Group to promote these islands in the USA they better make damn sure the promises being made are realistic or we are all going to get our fingers burnt.
I hope they show the real caymankind of beach thefts, home invasions, drunk drivers, armed robberies, car thefts, kidnappers, beat down muggings, greed, corruption, poaching marine life ect ect…
Do not forget racial stereotyping, scapegoating, sexism,unjust employment opportunities and most of all racism.
You seem so unhappy why do you stay?
No one wants to be around a complainer. Be part of the solution or just leave. Don’t stay around and bxxxx.
What about the eastern districts? All we get is promises, and none have come to fruition. If it was Cayman Brac or Little Cayman, there would be more than enough done to show them off. When will the go east initiative begin?? Just a pile of hot air.
You are absolutely right 925pm in the drive to run this place into ground so our greedy political leadership can enrich themselves and their backers we have enable outsiders to come here and exploit everything Cayman has to offer even our beliefs. Our current police service with its foreign leadership and enforcers is one of the biggest exploiters. Who deceive our idiotic leaders on a constant basis telling them we are safe and secure,so they continually pay this exorbitant cost to stem off this ever flowing tide of crime which they control like a fosset but so long it’s a foreign entity or person telling them it’s okay they are very happy and in fact overjoyed to go along with it The Richards group is just another foreign vendor looking to GP get paid. The great white hype strikes yet again! Poor Cayman! Built out tourism from scratch to now feed others whilst we starve!
Otherwise known as typical activities that happen in every corner of the Earth where more than 100 people live.
7.50am On a per capita basis we must be right up there with the worst.
Is that you Alden??
There is no transparency with any contract or project that falls under Minister Moses Kirkconnell including advertising contracts, CAL airplane leases, the airport redevelopment project and the proposed cruise berthing project. The PPM are no different from McKeeva’s UDP when dealing with public funds.
Maybe the new creative team can come up with a tag line that is a little less corny than “Caymankind”.
How about, ” The Islands That Time Forgot”?
Nah, we’re all caught up, just look at the crime.
How about “Not as great as you see in the carefully angled photographs, but get ready to spend more money that you will ever think is value for money”?
You are better of spending the money on high visibility RCIP officers to patrol SMB and Public Beach and to enforce the no selling/panhandling regulations.
Show us what surveys of tourists, if any are being done to prove the advertising is working as intended.