"Wish You Were Here" Campaign
Every unforgettable trip ends with the same postcard line, wish you were here. WWC turned it into a brand platform for Sun & Ski, the Houston-born specialty retailer that has outfitted skiers, snowboarders, cyclists, runners, and watersports enthusiasts since 1980 and now operates more than 30 stores across the country. Sun & Ski brought WWC on board to elevate and fine-tune its brand and image across all marketing channels. WWC answered with the positioning "The official outfitter of wish you were here" and carried it through a full advertising program, direct marketing, regional print media, ROP, outdoor, television, e-marketing, and point-of-sale and collateral design. The line gives a national retail brand a clear emotional promise, the right gear puts you inside the postcard.
Adventure retail sells a feeling as much as it sells gear. Sun & Ski earned its credibility the long way, growing from a single Houston shop in 1980 into a national specialty retailer with more than 30 stores and over 350 outdoor brands on its shelves. That scale created a challenge. The brand showed up in print, broadcast, digital, and in-store environments, and every touchpoint needed to feel like the same company. Sun & Ski asked WWC to elevate and fine-tune its brand and image across all marketing channels and to define a positioning worthy of the adventures its customers chase.
WWC built the platform first. "The official outfitter of wish you were here" repositions Sun & Ski around the destination rather than the transaction, turning gear into the means to the photo people send home. WWC then carried the line through every channel the retailer touches, direct marketing, regional print media, ROP, outdoor, television, e-marketing, and point-of-sale and collateral design. Each execution works from the same idea, so a customer meets one consistent brand whether the encounter happens on a billboard, in a TV spot, in an inbox, or at the register. The work treats a multi-channel media plan as a single story told at different scales.
Sun & Ski now shows up with one voice across print, broadcast, outdoor, digital, and in-store media, and the work has paid for itself many times over, delivering a 25.7:1 return on investment and $5.1 million in matched sales. The engagement has grown beyond the launch campaign into a back-to-school digital campaign, an augmented reality experience, and product catalog development. More importantly, the work gave a national specialty retailer an idea big enough to grow into, a brand that sells the view from the postcard, not just the gear to get there.
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