Six years on, Tasmania’s Off Season proves consistency still wins in marketing

Most marketing campaigns don’t make it past year two. By year three, they’re refreshed. By year four, they’re replaced. By year five, they’re forgotten. 

Tourism Tasmania has taken a different path - and it’s paying off.

Six years into its Off Season platform, the state’s winter tourism strategy is delivering record visitor numbers, growing brand strength and reshaping how Australians think about cold-weather travel.

What started as a counterintuitive idea, convincing people to embrace winter rather than escape it, has evolved into one of the most consistent and recognisable destination marketing platforms in the country.

And in a category dominated by bigger budgets and louder players, that consistency is becoming a competitive advantage.

For Tourism Tasmania chief marketing officer Lindene Cleary, the decision to stick with the Off Season was deliberate from the outset.

“It was always created as a long-term strategy to shift how Australians think about a winter holiday,” she told Marketing-Interactive.

“Changing it from something you try to escape into something you actually lean into and embrace.”

That long-term thinking runs counter to how many brands operate today, where newness is often mistaken for effectiveness.

But Cleary held firm, arguing that changing direction would have undermined the goal.

“You’re not going to achieve a behaviour change and a mental shift if you keep shifting things up all the time,” she said.

Instead, the focus has been on evolving the platform without abandoning it – keeping the core idea intact while refining the execution each year.

“We look at what’s worked, what hasn’t, and evolve it. But consistency is so important to us.”

A different kind of tourism play

The Off Season stands out not just for its longevity, but for its positioning.

While most tourism campaigns lean heavily into beaches, sunshine and escapism, Tasmania has gone in the opposite direction – embracing cold, darkness and unpredictability as part of the appeal.

That creative decision has become a defining asset.

“We wanted to cut through in a sea of tourism advertising that is all about beaches and blue skies,” Cleary said.

The now-distinctive black-and-white creative, paired with neon accents, has become a recognisable shorthand for the campaign – reinforcing memory and recall over time.

“We don’t want the audience to work too hard to figure out what we’re talking about,” she said.

It’s a subtle but important point: consistency doesn’t just build awareness, it reduces cognitive load.

The payoff from that approach is now becoming clear.

Tasmania recorded $3.6 billion in visitor spend from 1.35 million visitors in the year ending June 2025, with winter months increasingly outperforming expectations.

Brand metrics are also trending in the right direction.

“There’s one statement we track closely – that Tasmania offers a winter experience with a difference,” Cleary said.

“That’s seen a rise of 10 percentage points since we launched the Off Season.”

In brand terms, that’s significant movement, particularly in a category where perception shifts are typically slow.

The campaign has also grown into something larger than a traditional marketing push.

“It’s not just a campaign that goes to market,” Cleary said. “It’s a bit of a rally cry for our tourism industry.”

More than 790 Off Season offers and events are now tied to the platform, with operators across the state actively contributing to the experience.

That level of industry participation has helped turn the campaign into what Cleary describes as a “storytelling engine” generating fresh content and earned media each year without changing the core idea.

Part of the campaign’s success lies in how closely it aligns with Tasmania’s identity.

Rather than manufacturing a narrative, the Off Season amplifies what already exists, from dark winter festivals to unconventional experiences. Events like Dark Mofo continue to anchor that positioning, with the 2026 program drawing strong demand.

Ticket sales exceeded $3.8 million within five hours of release, with more than 45,000 tickets sold by mid-afternoon – a 16% increase on the previous year.

Notably, almost two-thirds of purchases came from interstate visitors, reinforcing the festival’s national pull.

That blend of art, culture and atmosphere is helping Tasmania carve out a distinct winter identity, one that feels fundamentally different to other destinations.

Competing without scale

For a smaller state, the stakes are higher. While NSW and Queensland outspend the market, Tasmania is quietly outplaying it. 

Tasmania’s latest annual report shows total marketing spend of $25.4 million in 2024–25. That comparatively modest investment, particularly when compared to larger states, reinforces how heavily the organisation relies on consistency and creative cut-through rather than scale.

“As a small state, destination marketing plays a critical role in overcoming consumer barriers,” Cleary said.

That has forced a sharper focus on creativity and consistency rather than scale.

“We’ve focused on being creative, consistent and distinctive in how we tell Tasmania’s winter story and that’s where we’ve been able to cut through.”

It’s a strategy that appears to be working.

The campaign has delivered more than 725 million in global PR reach and continues to generate strong earned media interest, supported by initiatives like Winternships and other PR-led activations.

A lesson for marketers

At a time when marketing teams are under pressure to constantly refresh, iterate and respond to new channels, Tasmania’s approach offers a counterpoint: stay the course, if the strategy is right.

Cleary acknowledges the temptation to change.

“It can be so tempting to shift things up,” she said. “But the audience isn’t thinking about it anywhere near as much as we are.”

That perspective – stepping out of the marketer mindset and into the audience’s – has been central to the campaign’s longevity.

“I’d rather invest our time and budget in understanding what works and leveraging that, rather than starting again from scratch every year.”

Six years in, that decision is still delivering.