The relaunch of Sea World is part of China Merchants Group's US$9 billion (RMB 60 billion) project to revamp the coastline of Shekou (蛇口), which will include the Hilton Hotel, luxury apartment towers, a museum partnership with London's Victoria & Albert Musuem, office buildings and a large-scale food and beverage piazza.
The revamp project is scheduled to be completed in Q3 or Q4 of this year, with the advertising budget amounted to US$6 million (RMB 40 million). Leo Burnett has also suggested Maxus to the client as media agency partner for this project without a pitch.
Lillian Leong, MD of Leo Burnett has praised her account service team’s professionalism, strategic thinking and client management skills which was demonstrated on this project. The team successfully got the client to award them the entire project at the end of their second meeting, without their creative team even doing any presentations.
Leong added that this account win demonstrated the client’s confidence in their rich credential in advertising experiences in the property sector, citing IFC, Pacific Place, Sun Hung Kai properties in Hong Kong and Taikoo Hu in Guangzhou as some of its client portfolio.
One of the iconic features of Shekou Sea World is a hotel in the shape of a ship. In 1984, Shekou was booming and there was a serious shortage of accommodation. To deal with this, the cruise ship “Ming Hua” (launched April 5, 1962 by the French president Charles de Gaulle, purchased by The People’s Republic of China in 1973 and renamed Ming hua) was moored alongside the dock and used as a floating hotel.
Reported in March, Leo Burnett Hong Kong has gained two multinational companies' creative accounts: Japanese potato crisp brand Calbee and will act as shopper marketing partner for Dutch paint brand Dulux.