LVCVA reups with ad partner R&R
One-year, $110M deal has potential extension
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority on Tuesday approved a multimillion-dollar oneyear contract with a possible sixmonth extension to R&R Partners to continue as the organization’s advertising consultant.
The board opted to approve the deal, valued at $110 million, in a unanimous vote. The contract includes an agency service fee of $475,000 a month, content creation at $600,000 a month and a media commission of 6.5 percent of the gross amount billed.
LVCVA President and CEO Steve Hill said R&R had reduced its usual agency service fee by 24 percent and its content creation fee by 21 percent.
He said the media commission remained the same at 6.5 percent, but the amount of media purchased is expected to be far less than in the past, so those costs also would be reduced.
Hill explained that the process to receive requests for proposals for the board to evaluate the advertising contract, held by
R&R for decades, had begun in early 2020. But the process was suspended in March by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Hill said a new RFP process will begin at the end of the year with the hope that a long-term contract will be awarded in a year.
The vote to award the extension came after R&R CEO Billy Vassiliadis gave a 30-minute rundown of how an advertising campaign for the reopening of Las Vegas had evolved through the pandemic and unrest resulting from the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis late last month.
He showed board members
“The Light,” the newest television ad, which is expected to hit the airwaves this week.
“Everybody calls this ‘the new normal,’” Vassiliadis said of the current environment for Las Vegas.
“I can’t get to that place. I just don’t want to accept that this is the new normal. So for now, this is the new abnormal.”
Vassiliadis said the campaign to bring people back is in its initial stage.
“We’re not close to over. This is not a conclusion,” he said. “In fact, it’s just the beginning of what I think is still an early chapter in this book, with a lot left to be written.”
Once the new “Light” ad runs its course, the campaign will likely shift to social media, with recent visitors to Las Vegas sharing their experiences, a strategy that has worked well in the past. Leading up to the release of the “Light” ad, LVCVA marketers encouraged frequent visitors to show how they turned rooms in their homes into a Las Vegas experience.
Once those campaigns end, the LVCVA will likely get back to its still relatively new “What happens here, only happens here” campaign, Vassiliadis said.
Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @Rickvelotta on Twitter.