Scenic sails against “sea of sameness”

We chat to Scenic’s general manager sales & marketing, Michelle Black, on the back of a successful launch of the company’s new brand and newest space ship, Scenic Jasper in Austria last week.

With the operator now fully rebranded across its external communications, website and fleet of coaches, the company is set to take the new name and logo to consumers when it launches a its latest TVC (below) to air nationally from 10 May.

“The rebrand represents one of the most significant milestones in Scenic’s history and sees a new creative direction for the travel company.”

Describing the new brand direction as a “start of a new era for Scenic,” Black said the new look also enables the company to stand out “of this sea of sameness”.

“All communications will now be in the new brand. Past guests have received a handbook which takes them through the brand and we will continue to work with the trade on rolling the new look Scenic brand out to their clients via local advertising, events … that we partner with them on,” Black told Travel Weekly.

With a focus on “luxury”, Black said Scenic would continue to evolve product offering on the back of customer feedback.

“Luxury is different to everyone. Luxury is not necessarily about price it can be expensive or affordable. How we think about it in 2015 will be different to 2016,” Black said, adding the company would continue to “exercise strong creative content”.

Successful this year has been pre-release sales for Scenic’s perhaps lesser-known Douro river cruising programme, which Black says have “exceeded” expectations by reporting double digit growth for the same period year-on-year.

Kathy Lette at the christening of Scenic Jasper in Vienna

The company expects the 11-day itinerary to maintain popularity and growth in 2016, as it is a “relatively unknown river cruising destination and offers many different experiences compared to Europe and France”, Black said.

“For our return guests wanting something different – they have it right here. We also offer extensions to Madrid and Lisbon which are fantastic cities and the Douro cruise combines with our Bordeaux and Seine river cruises in France.”

The company recently invited 150 travel agents to Austria for a shortened version of its most popular Danube Budapest to Amsterdam cruise, which coincided with the christening of Scenic Jasper by Australian author and comedienne and now ship Godmother, Kathy Lette.

Black said the most common agent feedback from agents on board was “just how amazing the ship was”, and that agents commented on “how luxurious and high quality everything was and all the little details that had been taken care of. They also loved the interior of the lounge and were also impressed with the new size and design of the Panorama Suites”.

While the company dropped the “tours” label from its rebrand, Scenic said they are committed to the coach touring products in its range.

“Canada continues to do extremely well and South America has grown in the past year. We have five new land tours launching in Europe in 2016 including 9 Day Bel Viaggio from Nice to Rome; 11 Day Alpine Escapade from Munich to Zurich; and 18 Day Balkans and Bavaria from Bucharest to Munich,” Black said.

Scenic are also encouraging agents to combine itineraries, such as a river cruise with land tour to up sell to clients travelling overseas.

Scenic Europe River Cruising 2016 from Scenic on Vimeo.