«The Open to wonder campaign not yet ready, video with archival materials»- Corriere.it

The reply of the is aimed at irony communication company Armando Testa to the accusations about the campaign to promote Italian tourism, criticized both for the non-original materials used and for the clichés used. With a paid advertising page on the Corriere della SeraArmando Testa “thanks” for the media coverage received, listing a series of reasons to be satisfied, despite the criticisms: “When a tourism promotion campaign breaks down the wall of indifference and manages to give life to a cultural debate like the one lit in just 5 days by “Italia.Open to Marvel” always represents something positive».

Slovenian video? It wasn’t the definitive spot

The campaign was especially targeted for the video

, taken from a foreign platform, shot in Slovenia, by a Dutch director: therefore anything but Italian. Testa is keen to point out, in his long list of thanks, that “it hasn’t happened for years that the news of an institutional campaign aroused an echo of this magnitude”, all the more so since it was a “campaign only presented but not yet released”. The advertisers then defend themselves by claiming that the product was not completed, and indeed that the view was only a draft: “Thanks to all those who imagined that the video intended for the presentation of the project – and therefore made with archival material – was already the official spot of the campaign”. However, the video of the campaign with the Venus influencer was officially presented during a press conference on April 20,
by the Minister of Tourism Daniela Santanchè accompanied by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Antonio Tajani, by the Minister of Sport and Youth Andrea Abodi and by the managing director of Enit Ivana Jelinic.

The costs: the 9 million for the campaign on all markets

One of the accusations rained down on the campaign also concerned the costs: 9 million, a figure considered exorbitant,

all the more for the materials used, and which Testa explains today as follows: «The 9 million euros of the investment envisaged by Enit are destined to media planning in all major markets: Europe, Gulf Countries, USA, Central and South America, China, India, South-East Asia and Australia». Even the symbols used had ended up in the crosshairs of the critics: Botticelli’s Venus in a denim miniskirt who takes a ride on a Vespa or is ready to enjoy a pizza had sparked a series of memes. But also for these Testa thanks, together with the “thousands of views and comments and discussions” that “made us really feel like the largest Italian agency”.

The foreign target and the “many sensitivities”

The objective of advertising, insists the company to defend itself from the criticism of having simplified and ridiculed Italian symbols by making them a caricature, is to «promote Italy abroad, targeting a target from 33 countries. Also and above all on markets that are culturally very different from ours, drawing attention in an easy, direct and immediately recognizable way to what traditionally distinguishes Italy in the world».

“We know what to talk about Italy it means taking into account so many sensitivities and nuances– concludes the speech. A cultural and human capital so unique and precious that it pushes everyone to work, and even to debate, with an extraordinary passion».

For this «Armando Testa thanks her, and Venus with us. It had been more than 500 years since she was talked about so much. If this isn’t a wonder.”