Brazil spends billions on tourism campaign for FIFA World Cup

Brazil has launched its tourism campaign to attract World Cup visitors for the June 2014 games.

Brazil’s tourism board Embratur has invested $20 million into the campaign, which will run until June 2014. The new campaign has been titled “House” and will be launched as a video on various digital marketing channels. It will be used to attract tourists from the US, England, Mexico and Germany amongst others to make them feel welcome in Brazil.

This follows after Brazilian Tourism Board President Flavio Dino announced the country would spend $11.6 billion on the modernisation and construction of football stadiums, airports and various other tourism infrastructures.

In a recent press call Dino commented: “We are confident that tourists will be well served and that the World Cup will be held to its fullest, bringing in economic returns.”

There has already been 6.2 million World Cup ticket requests that have been submitted into the initial application stage, with Brazilians requesting the most tickets closely followed by the US. Brazil logged the most ticket requests with 4.4 million of the 6.2 million and US citizens accounted for 374,000 requests. Other countries eager to get World Cup tickets include Argentina, Chile, England, Germany, Australia and Japan.

Embratur has expanded its offices worldwide to encourage tourists to visit Brazil next year including three offices in the US; New York, Chicago and LA. The tourism board is also working on capping hotel prices to avoid price hikes during this peak tourist event as it becomes increasingly popular.

With the FIFA World Cup next year and the Rio Olympics in 2016, Brazil is currently preparing to welcome visitors and host both events in spectacular fashion. With over $12.5 billion expected in revenue, tourism is expected to majorly boost the economy.

Sources: Travel Weekly, Fodor’s