A fresh approach to Airstream’s year-end promotion

Airstream

How a new media strategy and new creative led to outsized return in a constrained economy

When Airstream and Element Three sat down to plan their annual Year-End Promotion, they faced a challenging reality: sales were slowing, dealer participation in co-op funding was down, and they needed to make every marketing dollar count—while still leveraging the same promotional offer from years past. That meant refining the strategy away from capturing as many leads as possible to identifying and engaging people who were already interested in Airstream and just needed a final nudge to make a purchase while still establishing brand and product preference for future buyers.

35%

Lift in Sales

12%

Lift in Website Traffic

18%

Increase in Leads

THE CHALLENGE

Airstream faced slow sales growth and a tough economy—with competitors introducing new products that made the competitive landscape more difficult to navigate. That market-wide product innovation—alongside a mass of dealer consolidation— had sales teams asking a straightforward question: “How can we increase sales?” At the same time, Airstream needed to reduce overall spend while maximizing their investment through media now and moving forward.

THE SOLUTION

Balancing short-term return and long-term impact

Instead of asking “How can we generate thousands of new leads?” we asked “Who is most likely to buy in the next few months, and how can we get them across the finish line?” And how can we ensure this effort doesn’t harm long-term awareness building for tomorrow’s buyers?

This meant:

Leveraging a combination of national awareness media to drive brand preference, regional campaigns, and local activity with dealers to capture demand
Looking at people who had already shown serious interest—those who had downloaded brochures, used Airstream’s shopping tools, or engaged with multiple touch-points
Using inventory data to target ads in regions where dealers actually had Airstreams available to sell

By highlighting what makes Airstream special—its history, quality, and iconic status—while being smart about who they talked to and where they spent their money, the campaign delivered impressive results despite the smaller budget.

The Creative

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