Westjet and lack of marketing

[livewire]

With the arrival of West Jet from Calgary in a few weeks has anybody heard if our tourism promoters have done ANYTHING to market this city as a destination to Calgarians? Or is that just too logical?

[Oxl3y]

With the arrival of West Jet from Calgary in a few weeks has anybody heard if our tourism promoters have done ANYTHING to market this city as a destination to Calgarians? Or is that just too logical?

They already know...there isn't really a need to waste the money. Now Saskatchewan putting up adds everywhere makes sense, "we promise we don't suck!, please come east instead of west"

[southy]

Who already knows? If there is any advertising in Alberta - who is paying for it, WJ or City of Penticton? Come to think of it, I haven't seen any advertising other than the odd editorial in Penticton. Who is marketing this great news for the South Okanagan? The $100,000 marketing agreement isn't signed and sealed yet from what I've read (could be wrong) if that is the case, why would they wait until two weeks from the first flight to get this deal done. You would think they would have wanted to get a lot of advertising out prior to this. Perhaps WJ feels they have a captive market and everyone will rush to buy tickets. Time will tell. I do hope it is successful.

[Oxl3y]

Who already knows? If there is any advertising in Alberta - who is paying for it, WJ or City of Penticton? Come to think of it, I haven't seen any advertising other than the odd editorial in Penticton. Who is marketing this great news for the South Okanagan? The $100,000 marketing agreement isn't signed and sealed yet from what I've read (could be wrong) if that is the case, why would they wait until two weeks from the first flight to get this deal done. You would think they would have wanted to get a lot of advertising out prior to this. Perhaps WJ feels they have a captive market and everyone will rush to buy tickets. Time will tell. I do hope it is successful.

His question was do Albertans know about the Okanagan not do Albertans know about the flight. With the amount of complaining I see about red plates I am very sure that Albertans know about the Okanagan.

[livewire]

If you mean by 'his' question, my question. It is 'What are we doing to tell Calgarians that they can fly direct to Penticton' . Of course Albertans know about the Okanagan and they think the only way to get here is to fly to Kelowna. In my IMHO it is a missed opportunity by both the city and the PHA.

[southy]

Thanks Livewire, I thought that's what you meant. I have friends who live in Calgary and are in a younger demo. They listen to local radio and read the both the Sun and Herald. They claim they have seen no advertising promoting WJ new service to Penticton. Curious because I don't know - who would handle that $100,000 budget? Is it WJ exclusively, Tourism Penticton,
City of Penticton or a combination. Anyone know for sure? Also, where is this $100,000 coming from?

[southy]

Think I found the answer to previous question (sort of) This story on another site explains who is doing what, but doesn't indicate how they are marketing/advertising.

*bleep*/newsitem/westjet-enco ... an/it13494

[livewire]

I believe the PHA is still sitting on somewhere near $700,000, the battle with the city is over - you'd think this would be the perfect opportunity to redeem themselves. The entire community has been on their case to do some external marketing and it appears that they still haven't done anything. Our city and West Jet would have benefited greatly if the PHA had jumped on this opportunity, so would have the PHA to start gaining some trust back. And the City, well....they too should have been doing something to promote this opportunity to Calgarians. And in actuality the two of them should have gotten together and played as a team - shame on them both.

I don't know that they haven't done anything but I too have a large extended family and many friends and they have heard nothing about this flight or seen anything promoting coming to Penticton direct.

[southy]

Here it is again and I just don't get it. Where is the transparency with this City Council and City Management? You would think if some form of marketing is planned for this launch it would be advantageous, especially with an election coming up to let the taxpayers of Penticton know their plans. But, hey we hear and see nothing.

[twobits]

Just my twobits but I think that the powers that be, whomever they are, that are in control of marketing funds realize that the initial flights are starting in a shoulder season. It makes little sense to me to "blow the load" when wine season is pretty much over and there is not much to offer the traveller at that point. I am certainly no marketing expert but if I were asked an opinion I would say let the flights get started and maybe spend a few bucks on advertising for the xmas season and maybe some ski packages. I will certainly defer to those that are in marketing, but to me spending money on advertising now is like having a candy sale for Halloween in June.
Every travel agent and internet travel site will be well aware of the new flight connection for people enquiring about getting from Penticton to Calgary and vise versa. Just what exactly is the panic and rush to blow the load now?

[twobits]

I don't know that they haven't done anything but I too have a large extended family and many friends and they have heard nothing about this flight or seen anything promoting coming to Penticton direct.

Perhaps repetitive given my previous post but why would it be surprising that none of your friends have yet heard about these new connections? Have any of them enquired with a travel agent with a desire to get to Penticton? Have they entered a request on Travelocity or Cheapfights or.......any of the other travel websites for the best way to get to Penticton from Calgary? Once Westjet puts their schedule for service to Penticton into the system, it will all be available. When they are actually wanting to come to Penticton and make those basic enquires, they might just be saying "Cool, we can get direct flights". And we didn't have to spend 100k on bus shelter posters to capture that traveler. IMO, the marketing budget is better spent on a targeted market.

[pentona]

Full page (and those aren't cheap) ad in the Penticton Herald today advertising the new service. On the website it refers to "Seasonal Service". Wonder what that infers?

Seasonal service to and from Penticton, BC (YYF) starts Oct 26, 2014

[fluffy]

Here it is again and I just don't get it. Where is the transparency with this City Council and City Management? You would think if some form of marketing is planned for this launch it would be advantageous, especially with an election coming up to let the taxpayers of Penticton know their plans. But, hey we hear and see nothing.

Wait a minute, Livewire just hit the nail on the head a couple of posts back. The PHA just fought tooth and nail to wrest control of the promotional budget away from the city. I see no reason to climb down the city's throat to complain about something that another group supposedly has control of.

I have been commuting to Alberta for work for the last year now, flying Air Canada out of Penticton as it made more sense that fighting traffic to the Kelowna Airport and back. I looked into Westjet's Penticton flights as an alternative to AC and found out two things: 1.) Their flights to and from Calgary are midday, good for tourists and family type travel but the pits for business travelers and commuters such as myself. 2.) Their one way fare from Ft. McMurray to Penticton is about the same a Air Canada's return fare for the same route. You do the math...

[livewire]

Fluffy, there are still 2 tourism marketers, tourism penticton and the Pha, Pha spends hotel tax that is collected, city funds tourism penticton.

[fluffy]

Maybe I've got my signals crossed. Wasn't "Tourism Penticton" a relatively recent invention? Meant to take on the job the PHA wasn't doing, and intended to be funded by the room tax funds?