The West Australian government has enlisted the help of one of Australia’s biggest dance music exports Empire Of The Sun in a $15 million effort to bring tourists back to the state.
The campaign and new tourism brand “Walking On A Dream” features a re-recording of the band’s 2008 hit of the same name by its frontman, WA-born musician Luke Steele, and bandmate Nick Littlemore played over a series of videos featuring some of the state’s most stunning locations.
The videos will play in WA, interstate and overseas from Wednesday and are a part of the government’s $195 million Reconnect WA package, however the government has refused to reveal any short or medium-term visitor targets to measure the campaign’s success.
“I’m not going to share that target with you today, but I can assure you that we’re looking to really spearhead the growth of that $13.5 billion sector and grow that significantly over the next five to 10 years, and we believe that this brand can help us make our way forward,” Tourism WA managing director Carolyn Turnbull said.
Speaking in front of business and tourism heavyweights at the WA Museum Boola Bardip on Tuesday morning, Tourism Minister Roger Cook said he wanted to double visitor spending from the pre-COVID level of $13.5 billion to $27 billion by the end of the decade.
Cook said the tourism market was the toughest and most competitive the world had seen but WA couldn’t expect potential tourists to find it accidentally.
“This new campaign will ensure that WA stands out as one of the world’s most unique,
memorable and most desirable places to visit, now and well into the future,” he said.
Premier Mark McGowan said the campaign would build awareness of the state, which would then be converted into visitors later down the track.
“We are getting out there, we’re promoting the state, we’re doing everything we can to make sure that our tourism businesses and all the people who work within them know that the Western Australian government has their back,” he said.
McGowan refused to reveal how much Empire Of The Sun was paid to re-record Walking On A Dream but said the cost was included within the $15 million.
“We don’t actually go into those details because that puts it puts us at a competitive disadvantage for future campaigns, that’s a well-known fact,” he said.
“That’s the reality for all of these campaigns the state runs.”
Steele, who now lives in Los Angeles with his family, joked he was offered the keys to the city and two free jet skis to re-record the song, which has been streamed more than 600 million times on Spotify.
He said he jumped at the chance to be a part of the campaign.
“When we got asked, this is where we wrote the song, it’s where I met my wife, my kids were born. What a great honour for this song to represent this great state,” Steele said.
The videos also feature two WA-born Aboriginal performers Rika Hamaguchi and Ian Wilkes who dance in the campaign in front of iconic WA areas including the Coral Coast, Margaret River, Elizabeth Quay and the Bungle Bungle Range.
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