“The Sunny Side of Things”
Tripadvisor
Campaign Objective
To creatively entice travelers to San Diego by merging public art with interactive AR, thus leaving a memorable impression of the city’s fun “sunny” vibe.
Campaign Story
Tripadvisor’s in-house agency Wanderlab partnered with San Diego Tourism to commission vibrant murals by local artists in high-traffic spots. Each mural depicted a joyful, sun-soaked scene—and hid a QR code woven into the art. When scanned, the code launched a web AR experience overlaying the mural with animated sunshine, surf, and San Diego icons, plus generated a fun GIF “postcard” the user could save or share. The AR also gave an option to click through to travel guides on Tripadvisor, turning city sidewalk art into interactive trip inspiration.
Execution
Three custom murals (by Phoebe Cornog, Hanna Gundrum, Channin Fulton) were painted in NYC, Chicago, and LA
Each mural had a subtle but scannable QR code integrated into the design
A passerby scanning saw the mural “come to life” via a browser-based AR filter—e.g. waves moving, sun rays, etc.—and got a prompt to “share your sunny San Diego moment” on social media via an auto-created GIF
Trip-planning info and exclusive flight or hotel deals to San Diego were one tap away within the AR app
The campaign ran for four weeks in April, with local media and Instagram influencers amplifying the experience.
Campaign Success
Over 2,000 AR interactions in the first week. The campaign achieved an estimated 6+ million out-of-home impressions and 1,200 user-generated social posts sharing the AR “sunny” GIFs, substantially boosting San Diego’s mindshare as travel rebounded.
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