The Bermuda Department of Tourism is looking for a new ad agency to handle its North American marketing.
A request for proposal has been issued, covering advertising and media buying services, for the period of April 1, 2012 through March 31, 2013. The deadline for submissions is Dec. 16. Bermuda has approved an annual budget of just over $12 million.
Bermuda’s contract with GlobalHue expired at the end of March. The working relationship drew criticism after it emerged that the two-year $28-million pact had not been put out to tender, and Don Coleman, the founder of the Detroit agency, was a longtime friend of Ewart Brown, who was then Bermuda's premier and tourism minister. Brown was subsequently replaced, and the Bermuda government has set up a procurement office with oversight of the awarding of government contracts.
In the interim, Bermuda has been working with Ingenuity Media. Current ads use an illustration of pink Bermuda shorts and the tagline “Feel the love.”
In recent years, Bermuda’s second largest industry has been hurt by the global economic downturn, but in 2011 there has been some improvement after those declines. In the third quarter, tourism—boosted largely by cruise ship passengers—rose 17 percent.
