Stereotypes and doodles lift TouristR above the rest

Blognation Ireland referred favourably to the TouristR mascot when reviewing the travel site recently - "TR is a very smart idea as it changes costumes with each country you are looking at. They have gone with a lighthearted stereotype approach which only the truly anal will find offensive. TR adds a very strong branding to the overall site"

I would go further and say it's a work of genius. Wannita Phanchara's genius. As a student of Bernie Goldbach at Tipperary Institute Wannita has been coming along to OpenCoffee Limerick since the beginning and demonstrating her creative talent with her famous doodling. One such doodle lead  to the official OpenCoffee Limerick t-shirt.

Jan Blanchard, founder of TouristR was smart enough to nab and foster Wannita's talent which is now giving the startup a degree of character and branding that's putting it head and shoulders above the me-too competitors. Just look at their cool new business cards. Hugh McLeod eat your hear out!

I think there's an opportunity here to go further. Ireland has a great tradition of 'Paddy Irishman jokes', which usual start off with - "Paddy Englishman, Paddy Irishman and Paddy Scotsman walked into a pub.....". TouristR should run weekly/monthly competitions stating the nationality of a tourist and his destination and asking the audience to come up with a joke to fit using Wannita's cartoons as inspiration. Of course these should be as stereotypical as possible. You don't need to be offensive to be stereotypical so FU to the humourless. The winning joke should then be used by Wannita to caption a cartoon and printed on a t-shirt for a prize. Of course, every tourist with a sense of humour will want that t-shirt too when visiting the destination depicted.

"Heard the one about the Frenchman who started an internet company in the west of Ireland?"

Comments

[Jan Blanchard]

When I first met Wannita, I had a look at the moleskan book that she carries everywhere and was amazed at the creativity, fun and expression contained in such a small book! No need to say we were delighted that she could make use of her gift with TouristR. The first idea we had was to do a comic strip with TR and Wannita. Wannita (in the comic) would be traveling the world and experience the stereotypes of each country. TR being her assistant and telling her what to do and not to do. i.e. Don't wear clothes in a finish sauna and don't order Guinness in Cork! We thought about creating a side website (WLIDER - for Wannita Lost in diRections) and get users to post fun, stereotypes stories. Each month we would select the best story and make a comic strip of it. We didn't follow through due to the need of quality stories before we get started and lack of time. Your post may have resurrected the idea. Using jokes is a lot easier to set up that compelling comic strips stories.

[Damien Mulley]

James, blinder of an idea. Nice one.

[Bernie Goldbach]

I think Wannita is commencing a third year project along the pathway suggested by this post and its comments.

[Wannita]

Thanks lads! I knew my sketch-book would go places! Bernie is right, my project for this year is about WLIDR, so hopefully the encouragement will stay the same once it is done!