ELEONAS RESORT Crete

In just six years, ELEONAS has emerged as Crete’s leading agrotourism spot. What’s not to love? Located in Zaros – the island’s lush heartland – twenty two stone cottages tumble down the slopes of Mt Psilorotis and face up the olive clad Rouvas gorge.

The Saridakis family and close knit team know about hospitality in bucketloads. With stiff competition from the high spirited Cretans, it’s no easy feat to keep the locals coming back. But they do. The resort manages to pull off the rare stunt of pleasing every kind of visitor, from families (outdoor and indoor playground), couples (uber romantic cottages tucked away in the groves), active culture seekers (endless gorges, walks, ancient sites) and groups (large outdoor terraces, bar, swimming pool).

Our PR campaign focused on ELEONAS’ two new products; a week long cookery course and an olive harvest tour. These were aimed at meeting demand for the autumn/winter breaks, where travellers could find a ‘slice of Cretan culture’ in a stunning setting.

Secondly, we got our MADE IN CRETE food and wine trail off the starting blocks, with Eleonas’ team helping to drive the momentum with other food and wine producers in Central Crete. We invited high profile TV chefs from the likes of The River Cottage to sample the cooking classes and create a UK ‘pop up’ restaurant in spring 2013. We’ve got EU funding in the pipeline. Journalist visits scheduled from The Guardian, and easyJet magazine, BBC News, CNN and Ekatherimeni English language edition.  Maps and Apps are on the the horizon; watch this space.

Our strategy was to generate high quality media coverage in TV, press, online and social media – to generate coverage from August throughout the autumn and into spring 2013. Our burst of publicity kicked off with half a page in The Sunday Times Travel Section; ‘A Winter’s Feast’ by Susan d’Arcy which raved about the local food and wines of rural Crete. This was followed by a page in Greece’s English version of Ekatherimeni ‘Cretan resort creates initiative from crisis’, featured in Lonely Planet Magazine‘ best autumn breaks; recommended in The Guardian Travel Section as ‘best discovery 2012‘ feature; London’s High End Magazine; The Daily Express Travel’s ‘Pack Your Bags’ section.

Our social media campaign on Facebook saw a 400% uplift in followers and likes, as the summer progressed. New twitter feeds got off the ground, while TripAdvisor rave recommendations reached an impressive 203. Features on Visit Greece blog with images of olive harvest, listings on Lonely Planet website amongst others all secured valuable google rankings and helped online searches. Watch this space.

 

 

The Cyprus Tourism Organisation

As Greek speakers, we were over the moon to win the three year contract for the Cyprus Tourism Organisation’s PR agency. Our first task was to set our the year’s PR strategy, across all channels including full media relations in press, online, TV and radio.

Creating an integrated campaign for their ‘Cyprus in Your Heart’ branding, we organised fresh and exciting itineraries for group and individual media visits, such as ‘Head In the Clouds’ (hit the literary trail), and ‘Around Cyprus with a Fork’ (the slow food trail, halloumi factories and wine estates).

Working with the most influential travel and lifestyle editors, we secured priceless articles in national and online travel sections such as Metro UK and Food and Travel Magazine. We secured a half hour episode of The Travel Channel’s ‘World Odyssey’ programme, writing film schedules for their week long shoot in Cyprus; soaking up a carefully edited montage of traditional weddings, lavender farms and butler training courses.

Mainstream summer action was not forgotten; we covered it all; cultural concerts in ancient theatres to beach parties in Ayia Napa were successfully promoted via celebrity visits, targetted press releases and a twitter campaign.

Cyprus’ year round stakeholders, such as tour operators and marinas were supported throughout by our seamless trade and consumer activity.

AirSea Lines Greece

AirSea Lines Greece was Europe’s first seaplane service linking Italy, Greece and Turkey. The service promised to revolutionise travel around the Mediterranean by opening up direct inter island hopping and cutting out the usual lengthy transfers via the capital, Athens.

A major public relations campaign across the UK, Greece, USA and Canada focused on courting the international press and lifestyle media, highlighting the exclusive island-to-island benefits and conveying the luxury and glamour credentials of the service.  To maximise impact and coverage the service was launched at London’s World Travel Mart in partnership with an established art photographer commissioned to shoot a collection of photographs inspired by the AirSea Lines base in at Gouvia, Corfu. A dedicated campaign of courting luxury tour operators such as CV Travel, Greek Island Villas and Exclusive Escapes ensured  AirSea Lines’ services were a benefit included in their offer to all clients.

The six month campaign secured press coverage worth over £750,000 across the target countries.   Highlights included trips by ABC Good Morning America on the service; features in The Vancouver Daily Press, The Athens Daily News and Star TV Channels and all broadsheet newspapers in the UK.  Travel media coverage included features in TTG, ABTA and Travel Weekly and Frommers and the National Geographic Magazine.

Braemore Group

Boutique property developer Braemore tasked us with positioning its new luxury resorts in Croatia, Greece andTurkey. The properties, yet to be built, required careful positioning within each country and to their intended buyers – the high net worth international market.

Expanding on their success as an award winning developer, Braemore launched Aegean Hills in Bodrum, then Elia Valley in Kefalonia and finally Sipan Hotel and apartments on Sipan Island (near Dubrovnik).

Braemore won local and political support during the sensitive planning phase of the developments, working through public consultation, local press and government ensuring Braemore was recognised as sensitive to the local environment and culture.

Once successfully built, the second phase focused on managing a full media visiting programme for each location targeted at our media contacts in high net worth and national publications. An exclusive in The Times, The Sunday Times, The Sunday Telegraph, a wide range of travel and property media including Conde Nast Traveller and features in the national media in Croatia, Greece and Turkey helped ensure the successful take up of the developments.

Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau

For eight months, June Field was PR Director UK & Ireland for Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau running a full schedule of international media relations.
Highlights included three annual group press trips, twenty five individual visits, weekly press releases, monthly newsletters and promoting international events like the Galle Literary Festival.
She successfully lobbied high profile TV shows such as BBC2’s Top Gear and Channel 4’s The Five O’Clock Show.

In 2010, special events included The Chelsea Flower Show, the IIFA Bollywood Awards in Colombo, cultural events included book launches and guidebook awards.

June selected and escorted five specialist media on a tour of Sri Lanka’s luxury boutique hotels and spas, witih an experieince of the unique ayurvedic centres and supported the entire related infrastructure including hotels, airlines, wildlife parks, tour operators and rural initatives such as orchid growers.
An average of £40,000 worth of publicity was generated every month.