How Does Buffalo Attract Tourists

Maybe Toronto could learn something from them....they must have more than just buffalo wings going for them.

Toronto needs a vision, not a new ad campaign

Ads go over the edge
January 29, 2007

There is no denying that four "edgy" new ads promoting Toronto tourism are eye-catching and distinctive. One or two are even funny.

But they utterly fail in what they are supposed to do, which is to depict Toronto as a desirable place to visit.

One ad shows a thin woman in her underwear cradling almost non-existent breasts and asking her spouse if she needs a breast reduction.

Amazingly, that is meant to highlight Toronto's attractiveness as a centre for cinema. The tag line is that this city is "nothing like Hollywood ... except for the film."

This and three other equally obtuse ads promoting art, opera and theatre are running in alternative weeklies in eight U.S. border cities.

Coming in the wake of the city's uninspiring Toronto Unlimited campaign, the latest effort only underscores this city's failure at the job of self-promotion.

The new campaign, costing at least $100,000, is funded by Toronto's Live with Culture program. According to manager Gregory Nixon, the city program had some unused promotion money left over at year-end and decided to spend it on these ads.

He deemed the campaign a success because it was generating talk.

True, people are talking. But they are doing so here, and many are saying the ads are a waste of money.

In their target market, cities such as Buffalo, Rochester and Detroit, the ads are likely to generate more puzzlement than discussion among alternative weekly readers.

Rather than inspired by a well-planned tourism promotion strategy, this attempt smacks of an effort to burn off leftover money before the end of a budget year.

While admittedly saucy and different, the campaign is likely to be of little use in attracting more visitors. In that regard, it's a failure no matter how much discussion it generates.