Agency: CreatAbility.| Account Planner: Henry Louis Gomez

Title: Adventures within your reach | Creative Director: Alejandro Barreras

The Story: Royal Caribbean had just launched a brand repositioning campaign in the general market and was looking for an agency to do the same in the Hispanic market. The rapid growth of the cruise industry created a problem of excess inventory for the leading cruise brands. Research showed that a person who takes a cruise is very likely to cruise again. As a result, most cruise brands attempt to steal market share from their competitors by going after experienced cruisers. Royal Caribbean understood that with more than 90% of the population being unfamiliar with the cruise experience, the market for potential cruisers was ripe. The strategy was to use a unique image campaign in combination with Royal Caribbean’s innovative new ships/products to shatter misconceptions about cruising and overcome traditional objections to cruise vacations such as “It’s just eating 24 hours a day” or “It’s boring.” The general market TV campaign featured quick cuts, an irreverent tone, and the music of Iggy Pop’s Lust for Life.

We knew we had to answer two fundamental questions: 1) Would Royal Caribbean’s new overall brand positioning appeal to Hispanics? And if so, 2) how should it be communicated? Our gut told us that there were tremendous synergies between the new positioning and the Hispanic market. For one, the Hispanic market is younger and would therefore be more appreciative of the cruise line’s new active and athletic image. Royal Caribbean vacations also offer an unprecedented number of different activities for all ages, making them attractive to Hispanics who tend to travel in large family groups.

Because of budget limitations (both on the part of the client and the Hispanic consumer) we recommended that Royal Caribbean only advertise in markets within close proximity of their main ports (drive and cruise). This led to the creation of our tagline and campaign title, “Adventures within your reach.”

Strategy: Royal Caribbean creates unexpected experiences that bring out the adventurer in you.

Epilogue: We won the pitch and, in a rare occurrence, the creative was produced basically as presented. The campaign was wildly successful, lifting awareness measures, call volume and winning marketing awards. This was an account that anyone would love to work on.