Tourism Travel Marketing

See and feel your Dominican beach before you travel, thanks to a sandy brochure

By Kyle O'Brien, Creative Works Editor

May 17, 2018 | 3 min read

In order for tourists to experience all the beautiful and varied beaches of the Dominican Republic, McCann Santo Domingo worked with a travel agency to craft a color sheet – complete with actual sand from each beach – so travelers can see and feel the variety available to them.

Beach Colors RD shows off the diversity of beaches in the Dominican Republic

Tourism is the main source of income for the Dominican Republic, and while the country saw more than 5.5 million tourists in 2017, the majority of them flocked to the same three destinations: Punta Cana, Bávaro and La Romana beaches.

The Dominican Republic, however, has more than 200 beaches. The concentration of tourists flowing to only a fraction of the coastline was preventing development in other zones of the island.

McCann Santo Domingo partnered with Sweet Memories Travel Agency to promote the less-visited locations on the island. They wanted to show tourists, who are looking to find unspoiled white sand and blue water, just how many variations of those two assets could be found on the island.

McCann collected sand and water from each of the 200 beaches, creating a geolocated catalog of every beach on the island and its unique color signature of sand and water. It became a coastal Pantone of the entire country.

To create the catalog, the collection of samples of sea water and sand required six months of exacting work.

Two hundred recreations of each beach were hand-built from the samples and given to Dominican consulates and tourism fair organizers around the world.

A virtual version of the catalog was also built, and while you can’t feel the sand, you can see the diversity of the beaches. The website displays, in high-definition photography, the exact conditions of sea and sand at every single beach, and includes relevant information about each beach, along with directions on how to reach every location. Online visitors can also request a hard copy of the catalog.