Cape Town - At the recent Travel Expo Contiki invited prospective travellers to step beyond the pages of the brochure and get a taste for the “real” thing through their new Virtual Reality technology.
Contiki General Manager Kelly Jackson says the new tech helped them bring travel to life, “the headsets help us tell our story and to paint the picture of a destination, the two most important tools to create the desire to travel, and ultimately sell travel to 18-35 year olds.”
The use of virtual reality has been in the pipeline for some time for Contiki when it identified the technology in 2014 as a new, exciting and completely immersive way to show product offering at trade shows.
In 2015 Contiki’s global video director Ben Gattegno headed out to the US to shoot a number of iconic destinations in 360-degree video. The minute-long video features a Contiki trip manager introducing the traveller’s trip and snippets of the Grand Canyon, Yosemite National Park, Times Square New York, Las Vegas and the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco.
”We had queues of prospective travellers at the Expo lining up to give the new tech a try,” says Kelly, “and we were able to showcase our amazing destinations and experiences right in front of consumers in a way that is easy, engaging and fun”.
“There is literally no better way to get a potential traveller excited about looking over the edge of Iguassu falls, or casting their eyes around the top of Machu Picchu than having them put on a headset and experience it in virtual reality. One of our VR experiences involved Cliff Diving on Italy’s Amalfi coast. The sensation of altitude you feel is incredible.”
“We’re lucky to be in a position to innovate with VR this year, but with the introduction of consumer VR technology coming next year we’ll be working to find ways to remain innovators, continuing to push the boundaries of what brands are doing with this technology,” she added.
Adapted from a press release for IOL