Visit sunny Wales

Destination advertising was regarded as something of a jackpot in the creative department. It was a shoot that opened on a sun-drenched beach and only got better from there onwards – open air restaurants, clubs, booze music.

Then a brief came in from the Welsh Tourist Board to advertise Wales as a holiday destination...a hospital pass if ever there was one.

What we knew about Wales: it was small, hard to reach, with unpronounceable place names like Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch and dead poets like Dylan Thomas, dead industries like coal mining, a lot of rain, shit food and piss bear.  Yes, we were that ignorant; but, if we were, so were most people.

Over a pint or three in the pub we tried to find a way to make this place sound remotely attractive. And, as sometimes happens, an idea sneaked up on us. What if we positioned this remote, tiny, cloud covered, coal heap as the opposite to everything we thought?

Some joker said: “Wales. The Big Country.” 

And when we looked into it, actually looked, we surprised ourselves. Wales has some of the longest, most beautiful golden beaches in the world. It has the most breath-taking mountain ranges. There are vast unspoiled areas of natural beauty.  There are literally hundreds, if not thousands, of fabulous places to eat.  It is a country with a big heart.

We used the music from the 1958 movie The Big Country starring Charlton Heston and Gregory Peck – if only we were doing it today, we would have got AI to recreate them for our ads.

What started out as a joke, was in fact a big idea and it did what big ideas do: it worked.  There was a discernible jump in the numbers of visitors to Wales. 

 Did we have fun on the shoots? What happens in Wales stays in Wales!