SA tourism’s Old Mate Instagram account is very daggy
We thought the Old Mate tourism ad was bad — until we found his daggy Instagram account. And that’s the Torrens ... right?
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Old Mate’s Instagram account has attracted just 133 followers since the South Australian Tourism Commission launched its controversial advertising campaign a week ago.
And in his first post, Old Mate got the name of a major SA tourist attraction wrong.
The Instagram account — old_mate-in-adelaide — was created to complement the commission’s newest attempt to lure interstate visitors to SA.
On Monday afternoon, the account had 133 followers and had posted 25 photographs.
Old Mate’s first photo was posted on September 2. It was a picture of the River Torrens, however he stated the image showed the Adelaide Botanic Garden and captioned it with “Lakes are the Netflix of my generation”.
The photo prompted one comment from a follower.
“1. It’s a river, not a lake. 2. The photo is not at the Adelaide Botanic Garden,” they wrote.
Old Mate replied with: “Oops. Sorry there young fella. I’m just getting to know the place. Beautiful part of the world isn’t it?”
Among the pictures on the page were images taken at Glenelg, the Adelaide Central Markets, Henley Beach and Golding Wines in the Adelaide Hills.
It comes as the new Tourism Department boss has told a parliamentary committee she does not know how much the widely-panned ‘Old Mate’ tourism advertisement campaign cost taxpayers and the “jury is out” on its success.
Leonie Muldoon, who became the Department for Trade, Tourism and Investment’s chief executive three weeks ago, was quizzed during Budget and Finance Committee hearing about the SA Tourism Commission’s latest attempt to attract interstate visitors.
Ms Muldoon was asked if she thought the campaign sent the right message to viewers.
“I think the jury is out in that regard,” she said.
“It certainly the case that the advertisement has created a lot of publicity, many of which was unpaid for.
“As to whether it delivers the outcomes against the targeted demographic, I think that is something we will only know in time.”
Ms Muldoon also told the committee the she was not aware how much money was spent on the campaign.
“We are not managing the doing — We are managing the results,” she said.
The Commission’s television advert, known as Old Mate, features a man in his 70s visiting various tourism attractions across SA. His joy at exploring the state slowly turns to sadness as he realises he left his first visit too late in life.
The advert finishes with a voiceover saying “Don’t feel sorry for Old Mate — It’s his own damn fault he didn’t visit Adelaide sooner”.
The controversial campaign — aimed at middle-aged prospective interstate visitors — has been widely criticised, with the Council on the Ageing slamming it for using a “pathetic old” stereotype while the Opposition blasted the use of a Melbourne advertising agency.