Jaunted - Tag: Tourism Advertising

New York: The Cost of a Domestic American Airlines Ticket in 1964

JetSetCD — 2011-09-06T09:35:02-05:00

Got a $20 bill? If this was 1964, you'd also have a domestic flight on American Airlines for that little cash. We know this because we unearthed a vintage American Airlines pamphlet advertising the '64 World's Fair in New York City, plus airfares to it from other parts of the USA.

Only a few weeks ago we marveled at the price of an AA ticket from California to NY listed in this very same booklet. Cross-country roundtrip was only $145 back then, a figure which would roughly equal $1,052 today, adjusted for inflation. Of course the last fifty years haven't seen such a hike, so we've got a whole new perspective on airfare deals right now.

And then we flipped to the inside back cover of the booklet, and discovered the prices for a domestic AA ticket. Holy moly $15.35 from Washington DC and $13.50 from Boston. Okay sometimes—during their @JetBlueCheeps Twitter sales, JetBlue occasionally beats even these low-low prices, but dang. It's all just another reason to wish you lived in the days of Mad Men.

[Scan: Jaunted]

New York: New York in the 1900s: $10 Dress Shoes and Collars for the Theatre

JetSetCD — 2011-07-08T09:15:41-05:00

Times Square and Central Park attract tourists to New York City in droves, but what were the most exciting sights back in the 1900s? Well, steak houses, famous dance halls and of course the theatre district! Thanks to our find of a 1919-ish program from Cranin's 46th Street Theatre, we're exploring back in the day versus today, for NYC tourists.

In the 80+ years since theatre-goers sat down to read this program, much has changed and much has stayed the same. We've discovered that car companies will always target tourists, cigarettes once made for some of the coolest Playbill ads, and cosmetic companies will use any opportunity and celebrity to get you to buy, buy, buy.

The one category that hasn't changed so much however is menswear. Note that companies like Florsheim and Hart Schaffner Marx are still very much alive and kicking; President Barack Obama is notoriously a fan of the latter for his suits. The only thing not on a dude tourist's packing list these days? Collars. Good riddance.

New York: New York in the 1900s: When 'Paris-Inspired' Fashion Meant Something

JetSetCD — 2011-07-07T13:25:44-05:00

Where there are women spending money and having a great time, there will be ads for cosmetics, fashion and accessories. Going even a step further, there will always be celebrity-endorsed cosmetics, fashion and accessories. As it was in the early 1900s, so will it be in the future.

Browsing through this vintage theatre program, we noted a few trends in the ads geared at tourist women. One is that the items are all considered attainable luxury (hosiery, tweed suits, etc), so presumably the clientele of this particular theatre was middle class and looking to shop til they dropped in the Big Apple. Another trend is the focus on foreign style; this is the "Paris-Inspired" appeal.

New York: New York in the 1900s: When Cigarettes Ruled the World

JetSetCD — 2011-07-06T12:10:02-05:00

You don't see cigarette ads anymore. That's of course due to the many sorts of bans on tobacco advertising put in place over the years, but for the health benefits we've gained from decreased cigarette visibility, we tend to think that the world has missed out on some excellent graphic design. In the early 1900s, when theatre-goers sat down in their plush seats for a play or musical, tobacco was likely very much on their mind (and it stayed like this even through the 1960s). To smoke during, before or after or all of the above? The slick ads inside the program only intensified the desire.

New York in the 1900s: See a Broadway Show, Buy a Studebaker

JetSetCD — 2011-07-05T11:30:01-05:00

Say you're sitting down with $95 tickets to see How to Make It in Business Without Really Trying and you're psyched to see both Daniel Radcliffe (aka Harry Potter) just as much as you are to see a musical in the Big Apple. Believe it or not, almost nothing has changed for theatre-goers in NYC over the last 90+ years. The actor names are different, the musicals and tech flashier maybe, but the thrill and excitement is the very same.

Another thing that hasn't changed too much as the theatre programs, stuffed as they are with ads for nearby restaurants and luxury products. Back in the day, however; theatre went hand-in-hand with aspirational items, so programs were chock-full of the latest must-have: the elegant automobile.

Berlusconi Pushes Italian Staycations, Gets YouTube Backlash Instead

Omri — 2010-07-13T15:09:06-05:00

The only silver lining around Silvio Berlusconi's recent tourism ad, where he tried to cajole Italians into vacationing domestically rather than traveling abroad, is that he didn't actually use the word "staycation." That obviously would have been beyond the pale. Regardless, this commercial, where the Prime Minister intones about "Magic Italy" as the camera pans over the country's most famous landmarks, has already become a public relations fiasco for the government.

Rather than inspiring locals to embrace Italy's beauty and heritage, the commercial has triggered a wave of sarcastic YouTube knockoffs. The spoofs take the ad's soaring audio track and juxtapose it with images of roiling national turmoil. Instead of the Sistine Chapel, you get pictures of rioters; instead of fountains, crumbling buildings; and instead of coastlines, picture after picture of garbage left uncollected in the streets. That's what happens when you make a personal, emotion-packed appeal to a nation where 59% of the people think that you're too corrupt and/or incompetent to govern well. Oops!

New Orleans Pulls Tone Deaf, Anti-British Tourism Ad

Omri — 2010-06-22T14:40:56-05:00

In a repeat of what happened with the Big Ash tourism debacle, the story about the Gulf oil spill is slowly moving from the objective environmental problem to the political nonsense surrounding it. Some states are trying to overplay the disaster to get more compensation from BP. Other states are working to underplay the spill because they don't want to scare away tourists. And now we've got the New Orleans tourism board taking BP's money and using it to print snide anti-British tourism ads. Classy!

The print ad in question, which was obviously and immediately pulled once sensible people saw it, played on the devastating defeat that Andrew Jackson handed to an invading British army during the 1814-1815 Battle of New Orleans. The ad's background has a tilted statue of Jackson and then in the foreground, written up in some kind of weird Alice in Wonderland-esque font, the text: "This isn't the first time New Orleans has survived the British."