“Pure Michigan” spot campaign is pure perfection

Scene from new “Ann Arbor” spot

If that day ever arrives when the great god of advertising (wherever he or she may be) must chose the greatest ad campaigns there ever were, surely — if there is any creative justice to be had in that heaven — the sublime  “Pure Michigan” campaign will land at or near the top of that hallowed list.

Over the course of the past six years, we have watched this rich and hugely intelligent tourism campaign from McCann-Erickson in Birmingham, Mich., evolve — growing ever more exquisite.  Ever more indicative of what advertising can be at its most artful.

And rather sadly, “Pure Michigan” is a vivid reminder, by comparison, of what most advertising has become —  little more than an insulting means to a necessary end, namely boosting  corporate bottom lines.

For the most part, advertising nowadays stupidly drills a brand name into our heads like some kind of hideous, never-stilled jackhammer. Most advertising nowadays is designed as efficiently as possible solely to ensure CEOs make their numbers every quarter and save everyone beneath them from imminent banishment.

More than anything Michigan’s tourism campaign has been a comforting balm to soothe the mental and emotional wounds inflicted by so much advertising that is pure crap.

Campaign directly responsible for visitor trips

But “Pure Michigan,” it so happens, also has done a superb job of helping the state generate some super — and ever growing — tourism dollars in recent years. And may we remind you, Michigan has for years been bedeviled by many of the same problems afflicting Illinois, not the least of which is a dire cash shortage. 

May we also remind you that as long as we’ve been watching, Illinois hasn’t been able to mount a sustained tourism campaign that even comes remotely close to matching the greatness or effectiveness of “Pure Michigan.”

In 2010, for instance, Michigan tourism statistics provided to us show the state registered 2 million visitor trips and $600 million in revenue DIRECTLY attributable to the state’s “Pure Michigan” campaign.

By 2011, just one year later, those numbers had climbed to 3.2 million visitor trips and a whopping $1 billion in tourism revenue. Yes, great advertising can be a beautiful boon to the spirit, but it also can reap huge rewards. 

New “Ann Arbor” spot captures the city’s essence

The 2012 “Pure Michigan” campaign has just debuted, and it will feature one new TV spot, in addition to the welcome return of some instant classics from years past.  

The new spot, “Ann Arbor” is the latest in a series of commercials that have been added to the mix over the past couple of years to spotlight specific destinations in Michigan.  Already, Mackinac Island, the Henry Ford Museum and Traverse City have been the beneficiaries of this type of “Pure Michigan” spot.  

In this “Ann Arbor” commercial we see how effortlessly the campaign has shifted from work that has painted more general and wonderfully romanticized portraits of the state to a commercial that captures the essence of a single city without losing a scintilla of the poetic beauty or punch of previous executions.

We’re not sure how many copywriters have touched the “Pure Michigan” campaign over the years, but whatever the number, they all have miraculously managed to maintain a uniquely compelling, literate rhythm in the commercials that pulls the viewer into a world created via brilliantly-assembled words and images. 

Tim Allen’s narration enhances great copy

Of course, it helps immeasurably that, since its inception, the campaign has been able to use since the remarkably evocative voiceover talents of actor and Michigan loyalist Tim Allen.  As beautiful as the words of copy are in “Pure Michigan,” Allen imbues each and every one with an extra dollop of pure power that is impossible to quantify.

“City by city, town after town, one sidewalk blends into another,” says a mellifluously-voiced Allen at the top of the new “Ann Arbor” spot. “But there is a place where every street is different, every corner plays a new song,” adds Allen, before going on to extol the zeitgeist of Ann Arbor in a way that made us want to drop everything immediately, pack our bags and head for the town that is famously home to the University of Michigan.

Michigan finds way to fund tourism ad budget 

Unlike Illinois’s ho-hum tourism ad campaigns of recent vintage —which have been backed with just a few pitiful pennies from the coffers of the hopelessly bankrupt, visionless state (let’s pile on the casinos, shall we?) that commissioned them from what’s left of ad shop JWT/Chicago — Michigan and its state executives have been smart enough to put major bucks behind the “Pure Michigan” effort — a whopping $25 million in 2012 in fact. 

About half of that money will go toward airing the campaign on a number of national cable channels, while the other half will fund a media buy in regional media markets throughout Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio.

It’s worth noting that since the ”Pure Michigan” campaign first expanded to include a national ad buy in 2009, Michigan has seen the number of tourists visiting the state from beyond the immediate region begin to grow dramatically.  More proof, if any more were needed, that potent advertising given high visibility can work quite effectively.

And Michigan has gotten smart about finding ways to increase its tourism marketing budget by requiring specific destinations to contribute in return for a tailored TV commercial of their own.

The town of Ann Arbor, we’re told, kicked in $500,000 to become a major player in “Pure Michigan’s” national buy this year. 

So while Illinois officials make little significant progress — though there is plenty of talk and shifting around of bodies — toward establishing the Land of Lincoln as a major tourist destination, Michigan continues to show us and the rest of the nation how it should — and can — be done.

Pure bliss. Pure perfection.  “Pure Michigan.”  Long may it continue to give us so much joy.

See the “Ann Arbor” spot here. 

Client: Travel Michigan

Agency credits: McCann Detroit; CD, Mark Canavan; producer, Stacy Gizinski. 

Production company: Avalon Films, Detroit; director, Anthony Garth; EP, Audrey Pask; line producer, Shannon Cragin; DP, James Gardner; lst A.D., Chris Foote, 2nd A.D., Joe Likins.

Contact Lewis Lazare at LewisL3@aol.com