Tourism marketers gather for annual meeting, unveiling of new brand |11 December 2006

The three-day gathering, to be held at the Plantation Resort and Casino, will look ahead to Seychelles’ tourism future in 2007 and beyond with a view to mapping a strategy for marketing the destination abroad.

The meeting’s final day on Friday December 15 will also serve as the stage for STB to unveil the new branding of the destination, including the new logo and slogan for Seychelles tourism, as well as designs and concepts for advertisements and other promotional materials.

The new brand will finally be unveiled after an almost year-long process that was formally initiated at the beginning of 2006. STB and its UK consultant The Union, which is headed by Seychellois Ian McAteer, conducted various forms of research and held a series of both internal workshops and consultative seminars with local trade partners throughout this year, to eventually arrive at the new brand.

The local unveiling of the brand will be followed by an international launch and a roll-out of the newly branded materials in March ‘07 at ITB in Germany, one of the largest international travel fairs worldwide.

“The new brand will be an extremely valuable tool for marketing Seychelles going forward, and will truly reflect the beauty and diversity of Seychelles in its entirety,” says Nick Watson, STB’s public relations coordinator.

“The impact of the innovative black and white ‘as pure as it gets’ campaign can’t be overestimated, but every good brand needs an occasional refresh in line with both international trends and the reality of the product on the ground,” Mr Watson adds.

The Seychelles tourism brand has had a varied history, dating back to “The Islands of Love” concept in the early ‘70s, to the nearly 20-year run of the “Unique By A Thousand Miles” tagline, and most recently, the “as pure as it gets” campaign.

“The official unveiling on December 15 is just the first step,” says Mr Watson. “The look and feel of the new brand will be displayed throughout all of our promotional materials, in addition to our website, and we’ll have some TV-style advertisements for the very first time, which can also be easily broadcast over the Internet. There are some concepts within this new campaign that are going to really educate consumers and raise awareness about Seychelles and everything that awaits holidaymakers here.”