One visitor to this weekend's Sweet 16 basketball tournament in Indianapolis won't be as welcome as other guests and, in fact, may be considered a downright intruder.
The University of Louisville Cardinals play the University of Arizona Wildcats tomorrow evening at Lucas Oil Stadium in the NCAA men's basketball tourney. Louisville tourism leaders are taking the opportunity to launch an unusual marketing campaign to promote their city on Indianapolis turf.
Graphics declaring "A national championship is in the Cards" and other messages, along with the "Louisville: Possibility City" logo, will be projected onto the sides of buildings.
A Louisville-based marketing firm will use lasers and a large projector to spread the word about Louisville. As part of the effort, Louisville Convention and Visitors Bureau employees will distribute information about visiting Louisville to people on the street. It's all part of a regional branding campaign called Louisville's Possibility City.
The Kentucky city is a scant two-hour drive down Interstate 65 from Indianapolis. Traditional print and broadcast advertising campaigns to draw visitors from each other's markets are typical. But is Louisville's aggressive new tactic overstepping the bounds?
If so, the Indianapolis Convention & Visitors Association isn't about to cry foul publicly. It instead chose to land a subtle jab about hosting the Sweet 16 - an event that other cities would love to have. An estimated 30,000 people are expected to attend.
"We welcome the people from Louisville, happily, but if we had our choice of telling people about our city, or actually having them here to actually experience it, we'll take the latter," ICVA spokesman Bill Benner said.
The Louisville booster team will huddle in the parking lot of the Hurst Bean Co. at 230 W. McCarty St. near the stadium. University of Louisville fans are encouraged to stop and suggest messages to write on the sides of buildings, according to the Louisville mayor's office.
"This is a great way for us to leave a mark, albeit a temporary one, in Indianapolis," Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson said in a written statement. "We want the people of Indianapolis to know that Louisville is a city of possibilities."
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