The county council has launched a national advertising campaign to bring tourists back to Vera & Cuevas after the recent algae scare that saw the beaches closed.
The cost of the campaign, 25,000€, is coming out of the provincial tourism fund. It will run on the internet, radio and magazine ads and a series of posters. Despite the claim that it will be national, the print and radio ads are only running in Granada, Jaén, Murcia, Madrid & Almería.
There are two main posters for the ads, both of them showing a young girl enjoying the beaches, even if they aren’t actually our beaches (the advertising agency took the photos near Almeria city to save driving down here). In one of them the girl is swimming underwater giving the thumbs up sign; in the other she is dancing in the breaking waves on the shore. The slogan is Mojate (get wet) – “Vera & Cuevas beaches – beaches of the Levante of Almeria” (only in Spanish, obviously).
The PR launch was the occasion of much back slapping amongst local politicians, which I shan’t repeat here.
The VeraPlayaAzul residents’ association make some excellent points in response to this marketing campaign at http://www.veraplayazul.blogspot.nl/2015/07/veraplayazul-afirma-que-la-mejor.html . To quote via Google translate: “They regret that the ad campaign announced yesterday by the Provincial de Almería, with the assistance of the mayors of Vera and Cuevas de Almanzora, not spent to ensure water quality and proper cleaning of the sand, as well as investments to meet black spots in the area, such as the mouths of the rivers Antas and Almanzora. The neighborhood association, which represents the 20,000 inhabitants of the veratense coast, states that political representatives have lost a great opportunity to present the tent on the beach itself, which yesterday looked verdil intense as a result of discharges of sewage Villaricos .” Also, the campaign fails because the imagery and message portray nothing that is unique about the Vera and Villaricos beaches. The impact, if any, will merely be to persuade people to go to the beach, ANY beach, ANYwhere. Also, the last time I visited Cuevas town, it was nowhere near the sea. Confusing message or what?
Villaricos beach is always filthy,always rubbish and cigarette ends,when if ever does it get raked? Daughter came away with a bad ear infection after swimming there!