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Case StudyDestination Marketing

Escape to Fort Erie

A social-first summer tourism campaign for the Town of Fort Erie.

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Client
Town of Fort Erie
Campaign
Summer Tourism 2026
Services
Campaign Strategy, Creative Direction, Production Coordination, Videography, Short-Form Video Editing, Social Media Copy

  • 00

    Reels delivered

  • 00

    Shoot days

  • 0

    Clips trimmed, colour corrected and organized

  • 00

    Shoot locations

  • 00

    Approved first pass

The Idea

Fort Erie has beaches, historic sites, small-town main streets, family attractions, local businesses, waterfront experiences, and one of the most distinctive racetracks in Ontario.

The opportunity was to bring those pieces together into a tourism campaign that felt made for the way people actually discover destinations now.

We built the campaign around one simple idea: Escape to Fort Erie, then expanded it into six different reasons to make the trip.

  • Escape to Fort Erie
  • Escape to Small Town Charm
  • Escape to the Beach
  • Escape to the Perfect Afternoon
  • Escape to Unforgettable Memories
  • Escape to Your Next Day Trip

Social-first from the start: vertical footage, natural movement, quick visual hooks, trending audio, real people experiencing the destination, edits built to feel at home in an Instagram or TikTok feed.

The Campaign

Six Reels. One invitation.

Each one is a vertical 9:16 Reel, cut for sound-on scrolling and built to hold up on a phone screen first.

Reel 01

Escape to Fort Erie

The campaign overview. Quickly introduces the range of experiences across Fort Erie, community, nature, attractions, history, waterfront, and entertainment.

Reel 02

Escape to Your Next Day Trip

How much fits into one day: coffee, local businesses, history, the waterfront, Safari Niagara, and an evening at Fort Erie Race Track, all part of one destination story.

Reel 03

Escape to Small Town Charm

Focused on walkable streets, local businesses, and everyday moments that give areas like Ridgeway and Bridgeburg their character.

Reel 04

Escape to the Beach

Bay Beach and Crystal Beach are obvious draws, but the story extends beyond the shoreline into the Erie Road and Derby Road area.

The ending loops back into the beginning to encourage a natural rewatch.

Reel 05

Escape to the Perfect Afternoon

A slower afternoon: wandering downtown, stopping at local businesses, grabbing something to eat or drink, and enjoying where the day takes you.

Reel 06

Escape to Unforgettable Memories

Family experiences, Fort Erie attractions, historical moments, the racetrack, and the little interactions that turn a day trip into a memory.

Building the Content Library

The finished Reels were only one part of the project.

Production took us across Fort Erie, planned around movement, people, details, atmosphere, and experiences rather than only traditional scenic establishing shots, giving the Town a much larger bank of reusable tourism content.

Shoot locations

Where the campaign was shot

The footage library

461 clips, organized by location

  • A family posing for a photo on the giraffe feeding deck at Safari Niagara, a giraffe leaning in over the rail beside them.Safari Niagara
  • A cyclist crossing at Ridgeway Village Square, the black gateway arch and brick storefronts of the main street behind.Ridgeway
  • A still creek in Stevensville reflecting the treeline, lily pads across the surface and dense summer bush along both banks.Stevensville
  • A woman sitting on a striped towel on the sand at Crystal Beach, looking out at Lake Erie, a straw hat and beach bag beside her.Crystal Beach & Bay Beach
  • Still from the Fort Erie footage library: the Erie Road and Derby Road strip, a painted hopscotch grid on the sidewalk and rainbow-coloured storefronts down the block.Erie Road & Derby Road
  • A costumed British soldier in red coat firing a musket on the grass earthworks at Old Fort Erie, smoke drifting across the rampart with a cannon behind.Old Fort Erie
  • The winner’s circle at Fort Erie Race Track, a jockey in red and white silks on horse number 5 with the connections lined up on the dirt beside them.Fort Erie Race Track
  • Jarvis Street through the Bridgeburg District on a clear morning, brick storefronts on one side and the district building on the other.Bridgeburg

Responding to the Story

We kept asking what happens next.

  1. Instead of simply showing a beach

    show what someone could do around it.

  2. Instead of showing a downtown street

    capture the businesses and activity that give it personality.

  3. Instead of presenting a collection of attractions

    connect them into something that feels like a day trip.

Behind the scenes on the additional shoot day: two of the crew on the giraffe feeding deck at Safari Niagara, a giraffe leaning over the rail behind them.
On the deck at Safari Niagara, additional shoot day

Some requested moments weren't in the original footage, so we coordinated an additional shoot rather than forcing existing clips to do a job they weren't captured for. The new footage was reviewed, trimmed, colour corrected, organized, and worked back into the campaign: a stronger set of videos and a more complete footage library.

The Takeaway

Destination marketing works best when people can picture themselves there. For Fort Erie, that meant going beyond scenery and showing the experience around it: where you walk, what you discover, what you do next, and what the day can feel like.

Six different stories, one invitation

Escape to Fort Erie

Start the Conversation

Have a destination to tell a story about?

Tell us what you want people to feel when they arrive. We will figure out the footage, the stories, and the invitation that gets them there.

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