When a state tourist board set out to market itself in Europe it initially planned to open an office and a telephone hotline in the business district of the national capital next to all of the other tourist offices and advertise their destination. The problem was they had a very limited budget and virtually no packaged products (fully inclusive tours) in an overwhelmingly packaged market.

We worked with them to develop a marketing plan utilizing our Marketfire™ methodology. In it we created blocked space hotel and airline inventory, incentivized private tour operators to develop new packaged products and contributed toward their initial marketing costs.

With a vested interest in selling the packages tour operators invested more and more of their own money promoting the destination and selling the products. The distributors made fortunes, the state raked in over $100 million in new sales tax revenue and customers found one of the best-kept destination secrets in North America.

“SMI was instrumental in creating this marketing sensation!”    Executive Director of the State Tourist Board

A Scandinavian tourist board knew they had great destination products but felt they were overpriced relative to their competition and hesitated to promote aggressively for fear of raising unrealistic customer expectations.

Using intensive customer research we determined that the tourist board wasn’t clear about who their competition actually was! By defining their competition in terms of their current market segments they were missing entirely new markets for their many outdoor and adventure leisure activities. We helped them to repackage many of their fully inclusive tours through our Marketfire™ system and create more inventory through direct booking systems.

The results were spectacular! The country is achieving 10% annual growth in their newly targeted market segments that translates into $25 million in new revenue each year!

“I would not care to recommend MSI because we consider them to be a part of our competitive advantage in the market”    Executive Director of the Tourism Board

A state owned cruise line was experiencing low occupancy with huge seasonal variations which hindered progress on privatization and profitability targets. They had devoted much time, creative energy and investment in new ideas to improve their products and open them to a wider market. But, the company wasn’t sure they were reaching as much of their newly defined market as they could.

After carefully researching their customer experience in light of their new markets we were convinced they were on target. What they needed was a larger promotional budget, more marketing partner involvement and a modified version of the Marketfire™ system.

Today passenger occupancy rates have increased by 10% in their peak season and 20% in their off peak season making profitability and privatization by 2006 a reality.

“We thought we were on course but needed the rationale to measure our success in the market. MSI provided us with that and a clear picture of our competitive position.”    Marketing Director, Cruise Line

A small ski resort was seeing it’s domestic competitors enjoying new profits from foreign visitors. In the past tour operators and airlines had dismissed their profit potential because of their distance from airports and lack of large blocks of bookable accommodation.



We helped them to organize key local players into an international marketing consortium and pool space. By demonstrating their willingness to invest in their future we were able to attract the interest of a few key marketing partners “and the rest…” as they say, “is history.”

“International travelers are our fastest growing and clearly most profitable market. They stay twice as long as our domestic market and spend twice as much per day. What is more we are now seeing them come back time and again. That is all possible because of MSI.”    International Marketing Director, Ski Resort.

With the international prohibition against whaling, a government agency foresaw regional economic disaster for coastal whaling communities.

MSI prepared an in-depth market analysis on Atlantic sport fishing and whale watching. It demonstrated that environmentally resp0onsible use of ocean resources could be more profitable for boat owners than whale hunting. The results of the report were presented at the government’s annual fishing conference in 1999. To date 3 new whale watching and 5 new fishing business have been formed in the community.