Barrhead Travel’s turn-of-year campaign will home in on the benefits of booking through its travel agents to ‘cut through the blah’ in a shift away from the traditional deals-focused messages in peaks.
The retailer’s peak sales campaign will include a new-look TV advertisement on December 25 as well as radio, social media and print.
The TV ad will run regionally and nationally throughout January and February as the anchor for the campaign with the message: “we’ll cut the blah, so you can do the ahhh”.
It will direct viewers to its agents as the best place to book a holiday, rather than focusing on destinations, deals or savings.
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The campaign is designed to stand out from other travel marketing by capturing the frustration of would-be holidaymakers who are overwhelmed by the amount of holiday “noise” online during the peak sales period.
It describes the amount of holiday content consumers experiences when searching independently for deals in peaks as the “blah, blah, blah”, in reference how consumers feel about endless searching, price changes, trying to navigate comparison sites and contrary holiday reviews.
The advert suggests the antidote to the “blah” is to book with a trusted Barrhead Travel agent and as part of the campaign agents will have a badge for their in-store uniform which will say: “Let me cut the blah”.
The campaign comes ahead of the group’s major brand revamp with creative agency Designate next year to mark its 50th year of trading.
Sales and marketing director Nicki Tempest-Mitchell said: “We were always clear that to support another successful January, we needed to have standout in the market.
“Travel marketing, particularly in January, can often be heavily focused on either deals or supplier-led content. We wanted to focus on our best assets – our people – and move the dial to point to of the many benefits of booking with a trusted agent.
“Trying to book a holiday can be overwhelming, and we set out to capture the frustrations that people have in a noisy online booking setting – and then present the ultimate solution, which is booking with someone who’ll take care of the details.”
She predicted 2025 would be key for attracting new consumers to book through agents.
“We can already clearly see a shift in consumers moving to travel agents – particularly amongst the younger demographic – and I do think that 2025 will be a pivotal year in attracting new audiences,” she added.
The brand refresh is due to be announced ahead of summer 2025.
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