merit
For the 2024-2025 season, Steamboat was looking to evolve “The Steamboat Way” ad campaign in a way that preserved its emotional appeal while injecting a fresh energy that appealed to skiers, snowboarders, and adventure-seekers both young and old. In addition to its reputation as the place to enjoy Winter sports, the resort has a long history steeped in grassroots music. So, we decided to sing it from the mountain tops in our latest work, which launched in August. For year three of “The Steamboat Way,” we hired musicians from the Colorado Americana band Heavy Diamond Ring to write and sing odes about this unique place.
After decades as a world-renowned ski destination, a lack of clear brand identity had led Steamboat to fall into a sea of sameness: It lost its place among the top-tier ski destinations in North America. We needed to build a brand platform that was capable of celebrating Steamboat’s 60 years of Western heritage while also being flexible enough to adapt to the future of the resort and evolving consumer preferences.
In 2022, we launched “The Steamboat Way,” a campaign that that paired the resort’s legacy—which was rooted in rugged Western heritage—with the thrill of modern winter sports such as skiing and snowboarding. The “special sauce” of a Steamboat vacation was the combination of those two factors, and a trait that previous advertising campaigns had struggled to articulate. We launched the campaign by harnessing the power of Cowboy Poetry, a Western literary tradition that we used as our copy while images of alt-sports served as the visuals. By juxtaposing the two it became clear that they shared a pioneering spirit.
For the '24-'25 season we needed a fresh take, so we leaned into Steamboat's rich history with grassroots music. We wrote and produced songs with Sarah Anderson and Paul DeHaven of the local Americana band Heavy Diamond Ring to serve as the backdrop for our campaign.
We filmed the duo performing at iconic Steamboat locations, such as the scenic Rabbit Ears Pass, and local watering holes for the spots.
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