Published: 31 January 2023
It’s showtime once again for Western Australia, as the international rollout of the state’s global tourism brand, Walking On A Dream, continues – this time in in the heart of London’s West End at the iconic Piccadilly Circus.
The week-long campaign kicked off on 30 January with the highly coveted advertising space creating a dreamlike portal into Western Australia using the 60-second Walking On A Dream film, as well as a 3D animation of WA’s iconic whale shark floating above the traffic and commuters.
The creative campaign also includes spectacular imagery of some of the state’s top tourism destinations including Perth, Rottnest Island, the Kimberley, and the Margaret River Region.
Two additional sites – in the central business district of Canary Wharf and Kensington’s Holland Park – went live on the same day, shining a light on the stunning Boranup Forest and the Margaret River Region.
Professional dancers launched the Piccadilly activation reflecting the choreography in the Walking On A Dream films, and a competition gave entrants the chance to win tickets for a dream holiday in Western Australia.
The Piccadilly Circus advertisement will reach a potential audience of over two million people across the week. This high-impact advertising initiative throughout central London is supported by the Western Australian Government as part of Tourism WA’s launch of the new global tourism brand in the state’s largest international markets and is funded through the WA Government's $195 million Reconnect WA package.
Prior to the pandemic, the UK was Western Australia’s largest visitor market more than 140,000 UK visitors spending an estimated $249 million in the state in 2019. In November 2022, global international arrivals into Western Australia were at 63 per cent of pre-COVID levels – the strongest monthly arrivals since WA's border reopened. This has been driven largely by UK visitation, which returned to 95 per cent of pre-COVID arrivals during November 2022.
In December last year, visitors from the UK grew for the fourth consecutive month, making the UK the state’s second largest market for international visitors, after Singapore.
Walking On A Dream was launched domestically in September 2022 and, since then, has been introduced to international tourism markets in Indonesia, New Zealand, Singapore, and most recently in the United States, where one of Ningaloo’s whale sharks floated high above Times Square on New Years’ Eve on four impressive 3D billboards.
The Walking On A Dream UK brand launch in London is complemented by a series of campaigns currently active in market, set to inspire even more travellers to visit Western Australia and turn their holiday dreams into reality.
Hear from travel trade operators on the ground about the launch and watch the excitement on YouTube here.
For more information on the Walking On A Dream brand, visit tourism.wa.gov.au.