Sam’s feathered friend in hunt for the US tourist

Air New Zealand is launching its first global brand campaign, featuring a kiwi mascot voiced by Sam Neill.

The campaign will launch at an event in Los Angeles on Thursday and will be rolled out across the United Kingdom, Europe, Asia and South America in the coming months.

The advertisements will feature Hunt for the Wilderpeople and Jurassic Park actor Sam Neill as the voice of Pete, a computer-generated (CGI) kiwi who wants to see the world but is hampered by his inability to fly.

The campaign is a spinoff of a similar marketing approach that Air New Zealand launched in Australia.

That campaign used a CGI goose named Dave, voiced by Australian actor Bryan Brown, to get Australians to fly on Air New Zealand to North and South America.

Air New Zealand chief executive Christopher Luxon previously said the Australian campaign worked, propping up the demand for flights to Buenos Aires, on which 40 per cent of travellers start their trip in Australia.

Luxon attributed a large part of why Air New Zealand grabbed the number one spot on Australia’s annual Reputation Index in April to the white bird.

The first phase of the new campaign was aimed at North American travellers interested in flying to New Zealand, Australia or a flight offered from Los Angeles to London, Air New Zealand general manager of global brand and content marketing Jodi Williams said.

Research had shown the North American market could be a more lucrative one for the company.

Williams said: ‘‘In the past year alone there’s been a 26 per cent increase in the number of visitors arriving in New Zealand from the US.

‘‘But more importantly research shows there are still around 27 million Americans interested in holidaying in New Zealand, demonstrating the huge potential of this market.’’

She said ‘‘perception of distance’’ was one of the greatest barriers in getting Americans to travel to New Zealand, with some consumers believing it was a flight time of 20 hours or more away.

‘‘We hope to bust those myths and get more international visitors to commit to travelling on Air New Zealand.’’