In-flight magazines may slowly be heading down the same path as free airline meals and checking your luggage for free.  In its place? Say hello to the cooler, new kid on the block: in-flight Wi-Fi entertainment.

For now, in-flight Wi-Fi offers airline passengers Internet and e-mail access, but according to a recent NY Times article, airlines are looking at using Wi-Fi for enhanced in-flight entertainment.

As a traveler who frequents the 3 1/2 hour flight to Minneapolis, this was great news! In another sense, the decline of in-flight magazines was bad news to me as PR professional for  a creative agency.  Securing a hit in an in-flight magazine is like gold for publicists. Think about their monthly readership.  Millions. Not to mention many are business travelers (think affluent audience), and the fact you have a built-in, dedicated audience for at least half an hour, usually longer.

So with more exciting options like Wi-Fi on airplanes, I think in-flight magazines are destined to lose their prestige, in print form anyway. There may be a chance we’ll be reading our in-flight magazines on a fancy panel on the seatback in front of us. What do you think?

This week is the official launch of pedicab advertising campaign for Seaport Village.

Ten cabs from Yellow Bike Cab will be running the ads in the downtown area for the next three months. The ads are an extension of Seaport’s existing advertising campaign and coincide with summer — when Seaport sees it’s largest crowds.

What makes this campaign unique is that not only were we able to buy space on the pedicabs, we also created t-shirts with wording that ties-in to the cab messaging. The shirts will be worn by the cab drivers throughout the campaign.

Check out the photos of the final product below and this video we made showing how the pedicab company applied the artwork to the cabs. Neat!

Shirt reads: “Stop staring at my butt”

Shirt reads: “No weight limit”

Shirt reads: “My other ride is a carousel”

SkyMall – innovative gifts for innovative people. You never cease to amaze. Always there in the seatback pocket in front of me. And one solid reason print cannot die.Here are my current top five  six favorites from SkyMall:

1. Flair Hair Visor - A visor with fake hair connected. That’s not even his real hair. Fooled you, huh?

Is this what Ryan Seacrest will look like in oh, 7 years?Girls: ever wonder what it’s like to walk around with a shmullet? (She-mullet)

 2. Brightfeet Lighted Slippers – An adult version of light-up shoes.

COOL! I don’t think my parents allowed us to wear light-up LA Gears as kids. My sister and I were strictly the ruffly-socks/Ked-wearing type.

 3. Steripen Traveler -How Star Trek-esque. Like a phaser. Very cool.

4.  MemoryFoam MP3 Blackout Shades - Just wanted to point out she’s clearly sleeping on the job.

 5. Walk-O-Long – A $60 leash for your child. Not all children can be tamed…

6. Deluxe Prism Glasses – Are you sleeping? Oh! You’re reading? Are you sure? Why no ma’am, no one’s staring.

Ah, SkyMall… hours of entertainment while on a plane. If anyone’s flying anytime soon, please snag a SkyMall and send to me. Bonus points if you flag the items you like.

I have been reading, watching and participating in so many events and conferences lately, yet haven’t had a lot of time to share highlights with you, so even though this is a late night, not scheduled post, I didn’t want these good items to get forgotten.

At the Eye for Travel conference a few weeks ago in San Francisco, we had the opportunity to listen to lots of travel industry folks talk about how they are approaching social media. Some get it, some are still trying to figure it out.

My biggest personal takeaway, and what I really want to share with you is Tripit. If you haven’t tried it yet, and you travel regularly, or like to travel in groups, then do yourself a favor and hop on over there. It has changed my life. Dramatic? Perhaps, but when I can make travel resies for air and travel and simply send the confirmation emails to a Tripit email account and then get a notification that all my travel plans are organized for me, I’m happy.

It lines up your various pieces of information in one place. No more digging through emails, trying to remember who you booked that flight with and where the heck is the confirmation number so you can pre-board online. If you’re planning a trip with friends,  you can create a trip and all share your flights, etc. together. You can stop the endless email chains. And, special bonus, if you have an iPhone, you can download Travel Tracker and download your Tripit account to your phone. Travel Tracker is currently on sale at $9.99 so now’s the time to get it.

Oh, and one more thing – Tripit has a partnership with LinkedIn, so when you travel you can see who from your LinkedIn network is going to be in town the same time as you. But that will only work if we all get on Tripit. So let’s get on it.

Last week, MarketingProfs held its Digital Marketing World Virtual Conference. This was an amazing event as it pulled somewhere around 14,000 people into a virtual world with speakers, networking, and trade show booths. Now, I was never into Second Life, have a hard enough time keeping up with the first one, but this was impressive. Looks to me like the company that did the back end work to make it happen was InXpo, whose tag line reads Virtual Events. Real Results. It felt like new ground was being broken with this one. I think we’ll be seeing a lot more of these.

Finally, a few things comments about Twitter. If you have been trying to figure out how to best manage and enjoy Twitter, read Jennifer Van Grove’s latest desktop comparison post on Mashable. I think she’s right, for most tweeps, Tweetdeck is the way to go. And with its new ability to track Facebook updates it’s a keeper for me. But for those with multiple Twitter accounts, it looks like the new Seesmic, which took over Twhirl, is the answer.

Speaking of those with more than one Twitter account, there is a new agency forming that is dedicated to sending out Twitter posts under the guise of favorite characters from movies and TV. The woman who started it had created the character of Peggy Olson from Mad Men and did such a great job at it that she won a Shorty Award. So now she wants to make a business out of it. She clearly knows a lot about social media and PR, but I think this idea is a wobbler. Once people know that a personality is not real or being “ghost Tweeted”, they generally get turned off and unfollow. Why would you follow a “pretend” character from a show? It was a fun novelty with Mad Men as people weren’t really sure what was going on, it was the first time it had happened and it was kept under wraps so well. But the Twitter community has gotten hip to those tricks now and I don’t think they’ll fall for it over and over. But hey, if someone can make a living from it, more power to them.

And with that, I will send out a Tweet about this post and look forward to more exploring tomorrow.

Last week the Albuquerque Convention & Visitors Bureau hosted a media fam with about 25 freelance travel writers from around the country. A fam is short for familiarization and involves lots of trudging around from one visitor spot to another, with bouts of eating and drinking in between. I know hard work. But actually it is, the days are very long (10- 14 hours), and the media really are troopers about it.

This group stayed at the Sheraton Albuquerque Uptown (our client) and on Friday morning during the hotel’s presentation, were asked the question “How many of you know about Earth Hour?”.  Surprisingly few hands went up. So my client shared this video with them and let them know that on Saturday night at 8:30 pm, the hotel would be shutting off all non essential lights in the public areas and asking hotel guests to turn off their room lights and come downstairs and have a drink on the house, in the candlelight.

The hotel was sold out, so to ask every guest to participate was to expose a whole lot of people who probably knew nothing about Earth Hour to this global observance about climate change. We even convinced our client to do a 12second video. Sometimes I just have to toot a client’s horn. This was a very cool thing to do!

And just because it’s so great, here’s another great link to the night from the Boston Globe’s site. Worth a click. I can’t wait to see what happens next year. I think Earth Hour will really take off in the US in 2010.

It’s no secret that with the current state of the economy, consumers are watching every dime they spend. But that doesn’t mean they’re not spending. While researching ways to help my clients compete in a recession market, I uncovered several trends in consumer spending and key things businesses are doing to reach potential customers.

1. Watch how your consumers are spending. In order to talk to your consumers, you need to understand their mindset:

• They still love their booz. Alcohol sales are up 10% nationwide with the greatest increase at liquor stores (rather than bars) with lower priced labels and “sale” alcohol moving the fastest
• They are staying and entertaining at home more. Christmas sales may have been the worst in decades, but the gaming industry saw tremendous growth. Software games that can be played at home (in lieu of a night out) like “Rock Band,” “Guitar Hero” and “Wii Fit” had big sales. Hey MiltonBradley, Mattel and other game makers this is a great trend for you to jump on.
• They are making small splurges. Consumers are foregoing expensive travel and indulging closer to home. Instead of big trips, many people are treating themselves to small indulgences such as facials, massages and classes like yoga and dance.
• They want cheap transportation. While car sales are down, other gas-friendly modes of transportation are on the up including sales of motorcycles, bicycles and mopeds.

2. Offer customers a safety net. Under Hyundai’s new “Assurance Program”, if you buy one of their cars and lose your job in the next year, they will let you return it. See the spot below.

3. Give them something free. Anthropologie stores nationwide are offering FREE classes. Topics will include reinvention workshops to help you make the most of your wardrobe in a recession. What a great way to engage your loyalists and encourage store traffic.

4. Be where your consumers are. Your business is being talked about and you need to be a part of that conversation. On Facebook, Twitter and blogs everywhere consumers are giving feedback. I’ve said it before but Zappos continues to be a great example of a business that has an active, continuing presence on Twitter and other places on the web. And because of that, they are referenced to frequently (great PR, hint hint).

5. Be transparent. Especially in this economy, potential clients can smell marketing BS a mile away. Be real with your audience and they’ll respect you and want to keep the conversation going.

Zagat released the results of their 2009 Hotels, Resorts & Spas Survey last week, and in these times of economic uncertainties, it is more important than ever for the hospitality industry to pay attention to these results. According to Zagat, “the 2009 guide covers 1,001 hotels, resorts and spas nationwide based on input from 14,049 frequent travelers and travel professionals, such as meeting planners and travel agents.”

According to the survey, travelers’ main complaint about the hotel industry is poor service, followed by poor room conditions.  In a time where hotels need to work harder to gain and maintain customer loyalty, the hospitality industry needs to address travelers’ issues and offer them the services and amenities they are demanding, and incorporate them into their brand.   I thought about my priorities when picking a hotel, and came up with this list of things I look for most in a hotel.  I plan to share my list, and the Zagat survey, with all my hotel clients.

Service:  When I book a hotel, I expect more than just a room.  I want an entire experience, and this includes a high level of service.  I want a friendly, fast and attentive staff.  I am much more willing to overlook mistakes if they are met with an apology and a fast correction (an added upgrade, gift or discount doesn’t hurt either).  For me, the “make or break” aspect of a hotel is often the reception, concierge, room service, and/or other staff members.

Personalization: Little personal touches go a long way.  I don’t want to be treated like part of a herd, I want my specific preferences to be addressed- and hopefully remembered.  Everyone is different and hotels should treat each guest like they are the most important person in the hotel.

Value:  This might be the most important thing I look for in a hotel.  At the end of the day, I want to feel that my money was well spent and I got what I paid for.  I am always willing to take a chance on a new hotel if they are offering an irresistible deal.  And, if I love my experience, they will have a loyal customer for life, and I am likely to return again and again.

What matters most to you when you are choosing a hotel?

As you’ve read here before, we are thrilled to be handling the PR for Setai San Diego, the new 184-room premier luxury hotel located in downtown San Diego’s financial district, which opens next month (Dec. 2008). As Setai San Diego nears completion, the hundreds of design, art and custom-made features are being installed and really bringing the property to life. It is definitely unlike anything San Diego has ever seen and we think it will blow people away.

More pictures to come, but this gives you an idea of a standard room.

Setai San Diego has also just announced its dining and bar partner is Suite & Tender Bar, Lounge and Restaurant.  It will feature the cuisine of James Beard Award-winning Chef Christopher Lee, and will be a softer, more sophisticated take on the typical steakhouse. Suite & Tender is based on a gastro-tourism concept where diners have the chance to create an experience that is completely their own and will focus on choices, not rules. In addition to table-side cocktail service, it will offer a wine selection that gets this Napa Valley native very excited: guests will be able to sample various wines from a distinguished American-focused wine list, and create their own flights, deciding between a sip, a taste or a bottomless glass. Take a guess at which option I’ll be choosing from when dining or hanging in the Lounge…

I was in a client meeting last week at our office and we started talking about the economy and how people were constantly looking for ways to save money while not having to give up the luxuries they had become accustomed to, such as dining out or pampering yourself with a facial. My client mentioned how well a coupon magazine was working for one of the restaurants at her shopping and dining property on the waterfront in downtown San Diego and how the magazine as a whole offered such amazing deals all over the county.

Knowing how people like a deal, including myself (trust me, ask anyone at my advertising agency in San Diego), I suggested to her, and my fellow co-workers to check out this great website where you can search for coupons ranging from 2-1 offers at restaurants to major travel discounts. I was stunned when I learned none of them had heard of Backpage. I’ve been a user for years, ever since I moved to San Diego three years ago. The site is very similar to Craiglist, which doesn’t offer coupons, and they have websites for all the major cities in the US.

It’s free for people to post and download the coupons. Check it out, you never know what deal you might find this month.

We just wrapped a design project for the Sheraton Gateway SFO. With more than 10 hotels in the Peninsula competing for the same customers, we had to create something that would elicit a “This is different!” response from meeting planners and guests.

The hotel recently completed a $22 million renovation and wanted materials that reflected the feeling and energy of the property. We created the “modern airport hotel” positioning and sent a photographer and videographer on site to capture its personality.

Our design and web team created a new brochure and sales folder, as well as a redesign of the hotel’s website landing page.

The videos were scripted and edited to support our two key differentiators – the property upgrades and excellence of staff.

I think we hit the mark – what do you think?