Kampgrounds of America Turns To Reno Firms

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

For More Information, Contact:
Mike Gast
Vice President of Communications
Kampgrounds of America, Inc.
406-254-7409
mgast@koa.net



Kampgrounds of America Turns To Reno Firms
To Help Invigorate Iconic North American Brand

BILLINGS, MT (June 22, 2009) – The relationship between Kampgrounds of America, Mark Curtis & Friends, Boost Creative Services and Jeffrey Dow Photography began years ago.

From 1986 until 1990, Mark Curtis Jr. and Jim Rogers (along with the late Mark Curtis Sr. and University of Nevada Journalism/Advertising professor Bourne Morris) were partners in Curtis + Rogers, a leading Reno-based advertising agency. Ronnie Parker was an art director in that agency, and Jeffrey Dow began providing much of the firm’s client photography.

Rogers returned to Harrah’s Reno as General Manager in 1991. Today, he is Chairman and CEO of Kampgrounds of America. He splits his time between Reno, Billings, MT, and traveling the world the telling “KOA and camping stories.” Curtis runs Mark Curtis & Friends, a creative-based brand development and advertising company. Parker owns Boost Creative Services, a Reno design firm. Jeffrey Dow Photography is going strong. The three Reno companies have been working closely with the KOA team for the past 14 months to breathe life into one of the world’s great brands.

Rogers says the company hired Curtis to help direct strategic and creative efforts because, “In my 30 years of hospitality management, I have never worked with a marketing professional that better creates and executes marketing solutions that favorably impact the behavior of both guests and employees than Mark and his team.”

KOA, which owns and/or operates more than 450 campgrounds throughout the United States and Canada, began introducing its “invigorated brand” to consumers via camping and travel publications, its Directory and on-site materials, in January.

Prior to focusing on an “invigorated brand” process, Rogers and his KOA team created camping’s first customer-based evaluation system – Kamper Satistaction Surveys (now more than one million responses strong); the industry’s only kamping rewards card (Value Kard Rewards), camping’s most thorough and sophisticated employee training program (KOA University and the “Making it GREAT Program”) – and all of KOA’s kampsite employees wear distinctive yellow shirts; and the company’s unique “Work Kamper program,” which invites retirees to travel the country and work at selected KOA campgrounds in return for special benefits.

“KOA is not a new brand,” said Rogers. “It is an American icon. We were founded in 1962 and we have grown steadily since. Our challenge is one of brand renewal, not reinvention. Mark has worked with our management team and our marketing partners since early in 2008 to create our strategy and what we call our “invigorated brand.”

According to Rogers, while advertising in camping and travel publications has begun, KOA’s primary marketing tools are kampsite messaging and camping’s most visited web site, koa.com, which is also undergoing both design and functional renovation. A strong national and regional public relations effort has begun, too. In the past 30 days, leading into the company’s “primary season,” stories have appeared in TIME Magazine, The Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal Online, and many other publications, both print and online.

Lorne Armer, KOA Vice President of Marketing, elaborated. “We believe KOA is positioned well for our new economic realities. We are a fun, economic way to spend time with our families and experience the great geographic and man-made attractions throughout North America. And of course KOA offers many features of which the world is still unaware, not the least of which is a growing number of accommodations: kamping kabins, kottages, lodges, tent sites, Airstreams in some locations -- and other ways to stay at a KOA even if you don’t own an RV.”

To help communicate these competitive advantages, KOA’s “invigorated brand” introduced three new elements in its marketing and advertising, all of which are intended to communicate the brand’s clear competitive differences in a fun, fresh way.

First, KOA is embracing the “K” that has been in its name from the beginning. KOA’s new brand slogan is intended to use the “K” to distinguish the KOA experience from that of its competitors: Remember. It’s not camping. It’s kamping.

Second, while KOA has not changed its iconic “KOA logo,” two elements were added to it. The words “Welcome to” and either a yellow shirted employee or an employee and kamper will appear with it in most instances.

Third, KOA is focusing on real kampers to tell its story. Moving forward, KOA will be about the kampers. The KOA creative team photographed real kampers and ‘Yellow Shirts’ at the Santa Cruz KOA, Reno, Billings, MT, and at the company’s annual Jamboree in Myrtle Beach, SC. Dow also photographed kampground environments in Santa Cruz, San Diego and Cloverdale, CA.

Says Rogers, “Our team has brought us a new, fun attitude well apart from our competitors, a total focus on our guests.”