Travel and hospitality veteran Liz Crisafi joined Hornblower Group six months ago as senior vice president of marketing not only to help transform the brand but to rebrand the entire category.
“This particular category is one that has either not been thought of or it’s been very nostalgic,” says Crisafi. “When you think about dining cruises, you think about your prom or something you did with your grandmother years ago. It’s not typically top of mind for entertainment and experiences.”
Operating in North America and Europe, Hornblower provides everything from harbor cruises and gourmet dinner voyages to walking tours, food tours, ferries, and private charters. With more than 20 million annual guests, Hornblower’s wide range of products presents a characteristically dynamic marketing challenge.
“Coming in, I said, let’s disrupt this, let’s transform it, let’s create something new and unique and unexpected,” explains Crisafi. “That is exciting to me because you can reinvent and really disrupt a category like never before. I saw the massive opportunity and potential within the company and this brand.”
Drawing on her experiences at IHG, Discovery and even Kodak, Crisafi is leaning into how “experiences can really change your perception of a brand and a category.” Brand Innovators caught up with Crisafi from her office in Atlanta to talk about transforming the category, tapping into culture and how working at other brands prepared her for this new role.
Can you talk about how you’re reinventing this category and then what that looks like from a storytelling perspective and for the consumer?
We really wanted to come in and say, this is also an incredible venue with the view of your favorite city. This is an opportunity for us to look at how we take concerts on the water or celebrity chef experiences, as well as just the fandom of being in a very intimate setting with people that have inspired you throughout your life.
We’ve created sporting events like cruises with World Series champions, a night with Captain Sandy and Hannah from Below Deck Mediterranean, and beloved musical artists like Joey Fatone of *NYSYNC, Wanya Morris of Boyz II Men, Ken and Drew of Sister Hazel and country stars like Randy Houser and Lee Brice.
We looked at City Cruises Live and said, “Let’s reinvent the category.” It’s not just a concert. It’s not just an opportunity to have a panel discussion. It is an immersive once-in-a-lifetime experience. I liken it to a little bit of MTV Unplugged, VH1 Behind the Music and Priceless. But at the same time, you can put all those together and experience it on the City Cruises Live.
From a branding standpoint, it was a little beige. It wasn’t necessarily cutting through the clutter of how we talk about the experience or how we create emotional branding. Emotional branding has to be part of where you stand out because the brand is going to be what really transforms this opportunity for us. Creating a little bit of humor and being able to think about a brand platform, a message that will get your attention. We created the tagline, “Shipload of Fun,” which is a little bit cheeky and a play on words, but it also creates this moment that is like, “What did you say?”
Can you talk about the importance of connecting to culture to reach consumers?
People are having everyday conversations of what happened last night on Below Deck. We are becoming a part of those pop culture moments by having City Cruises be the platform to bring it together. It is an incredible opportunity for us to say we have brand relevance. We’re not just trying to create a partnership for the sake of it or creating an experiential platform that is just about our brand. It’s truly bringing together moments that matter with what’s happening in people’s everyday lives, but elevating them a little bit further.
Are you finding that consumers are really making bookings based on emotion?
We’ve got the Boston Red Sox with Kevin Millar and Friends. If you’re a Boston Red Sox fan and whether you were there or not for the World Series win in 2004, you can recreate that moment or hear what it was really like to be on the field for such a nostalgic moment. It’s a great opportunity for fans to share those memories with their kids and the next generation.
That in and of itself is why you would seek to purchase this. It’s not just something that says another concert or another experience that is interesting or unique. It is related to you and your own personal experiences. We’re breaking through the noise by doing what truly matters – putting people and their experiences at the heart of everything we create. That’s where emotional branding lives when we lead with caring for others, not just delivering a brand message.hen you put people and their experiences first.
Can you talk about how you mentioned your past experiences at some of the other hospitality brands, how you’re bringing that into your current role?
My experience in hotels and hospitality have helped me transfer a lot of that into this category. At IHG, I was focused on hospitality at some of the most important moments in a customer’s life – sometimes the best and sometimes the worst. When you’re traveling you want to have a comforting friend that greets you every time you check in. You want to go somewhere that is comfortable and safe, and knows your preferences so you don’t have to ask for a bottle of water every time you check in.
When you look at the hospitality aspect of hotels, the opportunity to have transferable experiences within our cruises and with our land and water-based events and experiences, that is very much how we show up. Are we putting people first? Are we listening to our customers, making sure that we’re thinking about incredible hospitality of not only what they need today but what they’re going to need tomorrow?
When I worked at Kodak, it was about capturing special moments. When you think about that today, whether it’s an Instagramable moment or a TikTok trend, consumers today want to feel seen and heard – and at every interaction.
What are some of the marketing challenges you’re facing this year?
I use the word opportunity a lot with my team. There’s a lot of opportunity for us to improve the digital guest experience for us to improve the customer journey. One of the things that we’re working through right now is how do we evolve our e-commerce and web experience as much as we’re looking at our demand gen. How do we simplify the digital customer journey? We have over 16 ports in the US alone and everything from the Statue of Liberty to Alcatraz to Niagara Falls, as well as the dining cruises. We want to simplify the homepage experience so that it is very relevant, contextual and personalized.
We’re having to rebuild everything from the ground up and that takes time. How do we manage the complexity of where we are today to where we want to go tomorrow? The branding piece and the experience piece are critical for us to create the demand, but for us to be able to capture and convert the demand. Technology is ever-changing, and today is now a daily exercise in creating great guest experiences across every interaction.
