Greek Summer is a State of Mind

Director: Thanasis Papathanasiou

Producer: Yannis Paraskevopoulos

Producer Company: DTMH Tecnologies

Agency: Frank & Fame

Client: Marketing Greece S.A.

Country: Greece

Synopsis


The film highlights the defining characteristics of Greece and aspires to create a new brand around Greek Summer that is relevant to and respectful of our shared sacrifices and suffering during the Covid-19 pandemic.
 
Greek Summer is a State of Mind was launched in June 2020, just as Greece was coming out of its first lockdown. The country had gained international recognition for successfully managing the first wave of the pandemic. But as with all countries whose economies are dependent on tourism (20% in the case of Greece), a decision had to be made as to how to re-engage with people who were still in shock at the rapid spread and repercussions of Covid-19. People who were in different stages of lockdown themselves.
 
Campaigns from competitor countries began to invite travelers, chiefly by promoting landscapes and experiences. Marketing Greece, always striving to push the boundaries through thought leadership with its campaigns, opted for a different approach.
 
Through a single shot film, we chose to touch on the most basic and fragile aspects of humanity taken from us during lockdown via the values of Greek Summer? specifically those of feeling free, connecting with nature and being with the people we love.
  
What we see in the film is a brand that encourages the public to share its values wherever they find themselves, promoting the human dimension of Greece, one that shares, understands and is ready to welcome you when the time is right for you.
  

Objectives

In order to create a new brand around Greek Summer, we focused on the emotions of being on a summer holiday in Greece and built on the positivity and feeling of safety that Greece created for itself through its successful management of Covid-19.
The strategic choice of single-shot footage was to create a "canvas" on which the values of Greek Summer could be presented, so as not to distract the viewer with the usual sequence of impressive - and expected - landmark images of a Greek summer holiday. The latter approach was explored through AB Testing, with the results suggesting a single-footage video would be more impactful.
The main goal of Greece?s new tourism campaign is to remind international visitors of the feeling of Greek Summer and to rekindle the emotions of those who have already visited. It is to emphasize that being on holiday in Greece is to experience something deeper, more true, more human than elsewhere. It?s the combined feeling of freedom, contact with nature and being with the people you love most ? exactly what the pandemic has robbed from us all but what we can look forward to experiencing again.