Amro Worldwide

Where do I start with this one?

It's been a surreal week, and I've only been on the edge of it.

Let's start at the beginning. Andrew wanted a new type of advertising for the travel business and hit on doing panels on the London Underground around the time of Pride. To spread the cost he dealt with 5 American states who were happy to come on board. The 'So Gay' campaign was launched. At the last minute, South Carolina asked us if they could join the campaign and we agreed.

So for the past 2 weeks we have had a series of posters running up Leicester Square Underground advertising a number of American states as well as advertising Amro Worldwide. The tag line is 'so gay' as in 'Las Vegas is So Gay', 'South Carolina is So Gay' etc. The reasoning was that this reclaimed this phrase for the gay community and showed the attractions of each destination for gay and lesbian travellers.

The campaign was launched and went very well.

Then a blog in South Carolina objected to public money going to fund a campaign to attract gay travellers. The blog should have just been ignored but suddenly a Senator and then the Governor in Sough Carolina agreed and demanded that the ad be pulled and stated that they would not pay for the campaign. The person who approved the campaign was made to resign.

Suddenly the story grew and by today it has been featured in numerous US newspapers, blog sites, television news broadcasts etc and also now by media outlets in Britian.

This has given Amro Worldwide publicity and focus which we could never have afforded to buy. For us it has suddenly put Amro in the spotlight and hopefully shown the gay community that we are a serious travel company in their market.

As examples, it has been reported on by Time magazine in the States and the Guardian over here as well as on American television and on various blogsites.



It's all amazing. I can't believe the welter of publicity which at the moment shows no signs of abating. I am sure that the Senator and Governor regret what they have started. Amro, meanwhile, will continue to tell the truth and hopefully gather the positive exposure from the story.