Our target were Ecuadorians who generally travel outside the country when going on vacations. Our goal was to change their perception about the country and increase the level of internal tourism among this target group.

We researched among the top tourist destinations for Ecuadorians and Costa Rica was amongst them. Costa Rica and Ecuador share very similar climates and attractions. So we decided to leverage the attractiveness of our country’s landscapes, with the name of another country that sounded a little bit more “exotic”.

We developed a promotional campaign to make Ecuadorian tourists experience the beauty of our country by making them believe they were elsewhere. We invited a group of 40 travellers to an exotic destination in “Costa Rica” but in reality we landed in Tena’s airpot in Ecuador. We disguised the destination as a Costa Rican village and the travellers had a great time rafting and bathing in the river. After the trip, we surprised them by revealing that they had never left the country.

The travellers felt proud and pleased to know they could experience world class tourism in their own country.

Every traveller chose to stay in Ecuador for the Holiday, proving the experiential campaign successful.

We invited a group of 40 travellers to an exotic destination in “Golfito, Costa Rica”. We simulated a long journey but actually landed in the Tena’s airport in Ecuador. We made sure that they thought they were actually in Costa Rica. We disguised the airport, set up souvenir shops and Costa Rican car plates and traffic signs.

12 of the travellers already knew about our plan and helped us keep the rest of the group ‘uninformed’. We even recorded a full day of a Costa Rican radio station and played on the way to their adventure so that they didn’t even suspect the were not there. We also hired tour guides with a foreign accents. The travellers had a great time rafting and bathing in the river. On their back to the airport, we revealed where they actually were and told them they had never left the country.

We published the story right before a national holiday. The campaign even provoked a minor diplomatic argument between Costa Rica and Ecuador which was quickly solved making an internal campaign into a global issue.

We received 19 MILLION MEDIA IMPRESSIONS

and 1480 MEDIA PLACEMENTS including coverage from CNN, Yahoo News and Mashable.

The CEO of TAME (the airline involved) announced that the even the routes to Esmeraldas and Manta (2 unpopular destinations) had been sold out in a matter of days after the release of the story.

Sales for domestic flights rose by 17% as compared to last year’s holiday. This proved the positive promotional impact the campaign had among Ecuadorians and their perception towards internal tourism.

The video of the trip was mailed to the airline's database of passengers who usually travel abroad. 23% of them decided to vacation in Ecuador.

Ecuador is investing to become a top tourist destination. The country wants foreigners to visit and locals to stay and travel around the country.

Yet, many Ecuadorians choose to travel outside instead of discovering what their country has to offer.

To promote internal tourism in Ecuador, the Ecuadorian Ministry of Tourism asked us to develop a campaign that would prove that Ecuador is a top tourist destination

Costa Rica and Ecuador share very similar climates and attractions. So we decided to leverage the attractiveness of our country’s landscapes, with the name of a country that sounded a bit more “exotic”.