Governor Andrew Cuomo broke New York's heart, or more like completely threw it away in an attempt to find something better. In an action that some New Yorkers are calling heartless, the iconic "I Love NY" symbol is being replaced as part of a new tourism campaign.
The 40-year-old logo is being redesigned to try to draw in more tourists. Cuomo is asking New Yorkers to redraw the logo and replace the heart with something that they love most about New York. Participants can draw whatever they want and post it to the gallery on iloveny.com.
"You still have the icon but you have to bring it back to New York," Gov. Cuomo explained. "You have to reimagine, you have to reenergize it."
Some examples that were given are drawings of pizza, taxis, cameras, and apples. The concept seems a bit strange as the logo would read "I pizza NY" or "I taxi NY."
The submissions will be used in TV ads, print ads, and in social media campaigns on Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube. Some of the ads will be placed on New York taxis and the TV ads will air in upstate New York, Connecticut, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Toronto, and Montreal.
"Tourism is vital to the economy of our state, supporting nearly 500,000 jobs and generating tens of billions of dollars in revenues for the state and businesses," Gov. Cuomo added. "This campaign reinvents one of our state's great assets -- the 'I Love NY' icon -- which is known the world over as one of the most successful advertising symbols ever. This campaign brings that icon to life in order to highlight all of the things people love about New York."
While Cuomo believes the change will be successful, New Yorkers aren't so thrilled about it.
New York Daily News reporter Kennth Lovett called it "an elementary school project where kids draw what they like most about their state." He went on to say "Replacing the heart ... with drawings of things like pizza slices and beach balls for the sake of modernization is like slapping tattoos on the Statue of Liberty to keep up with the trends of the 21st century."
Some New Yorkers expressed their disapproval saying that the campaign is a waste of tax dollars. The new ads are part of a $5 million tourism marketing campaign.
The idea of this ad campaign came from advertising firm BBDO North America. David Lubars, the organization's chairman and chief creative officer, believes that the old "I Love NY" campaign is overdone and it hasn't been used in a while, so this redesign is a way to revitalize the logo.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
