Following Tropical Storm Irene’s August 2011 devastation and a major fire in an historic building in downtown Brattleboro in April 2011, Brattleboro’s Chamber of Commerce Executive Director, Jerry Goldberg, needed something big to bring business and tourism back to town.
The former CBS executive, thinking out of the box and reaching back into his network television marketing and communications quiver, orchestrated a promotion with Horizon Travel Magazine to put Brattleboro center stage at the crossroads of the world’Times Square. Horizon is distributed to approximately 100,000 readers in the New York City vicinity and is available elsewhere as well.
The best part of the advertising opportunity was the chance to produce Brattleboro’s first star turn in New York City with a ‘commercial’on Broadway!’
So, debuting on September 7th and running through the 13th, Brattleboro, Vermont ‘#11 on Smithsonian magazine’s Best 20 Small Towns in America list -- and Goldberg’s One and Only Brattleboro campaign will be featured on ABC and MTV’s Astrovision screens. The 5-second ad, comprised of four local images and the One and Only Brattleboro logo will run in rotation on each screen 120 times during that week for a total of 20 minutes ‘on Broadway’-- besting Andy Warhol’s legendary 15 minutes of fame.
‘Reports from Horizon confirm that an estimated 1 million passers-by a day could see the Brattleboro spot,’commented Goldberg.
Brattleboro’s in good company, too. The Horizon program ‘in partnership with both ABC and MTV ‘has featured in its rotation such well-known tourist havens as Ogunquit, Maine; Long Island’s Hamptons and Saratoga, New York; municipalities like Albany, New York and Winston Salem, North Carolina and a variety of companies and organizations such as Ford, Marriott, Warner Brothers and even Make-A-Wish.
‘The big kick for me,’added Goldberg, ‘is that one of the shots in our ad is of our Brattleboro Next 3 Exits sign on Interstate 91. We worked to get it re-instated on the highway a few years ago. It had been removed during the construction of the Guilford Welcome Center and we needed it back. I was so excited that it was finally installed that I asked my colleague to photograph me standing next to the huge sign. So I’m making my Broadway debut, too ‘along with the town I love!’
BRATTLEBORO, VT’September 7’