As we continue our month of profiling groups and individuals at the forefront of gay and lesbian communications, Orbitz.com has announced a LGBT charitable auction to coincide with Pride month.
The auction is their biggest online promotion to support LGBT and AIDS charities. Visitors can bid on travel auctions including trips to the Cyndi Lauper / LOGO True Colors Tour, stays at gay-friendly Hyatt resorts, and business class flights to Europe. Auction proceeds support charities including HRC, GLAAD, PFLAG, the Matthew Shepard Foundation, Commercial Closet Association, and others.
This auction is the latest example of Orbitz’s sponsorship of 30 gay and/or AIDS groups and events. It is also one of the sponsors of this summer’s True Colors tour.
What’s great about these initiatives is that not only are they helping the company’s bottom line, but are also helping out LGBT organizations. The huge number of sponsorships must mean that Orbitz is seeing ROI, both from an image and from a dollar standpoint.
Orbitz can easily be seen as a model company for LGBT outreach as it recognizes the wealth of opportunity in marketing to LGBT consumers. Orbitz revolutionalized the gay travel industry by devoting an entire section of their site to meeting the needs of gay travelers.
Apart from their business model and goodwill initiatives, they create commercials targeted at the gay community and include realistic gay relationships in their larger marketing efforts.
Since 2001, Orbitz.com has made humorously inclusive LGBT portrayals a central part of its advertising to both gay and straight audiences. Most recently it was nominated for Outstanding Commercial at Commercial Closet Association’s Images in Advertising Awards. The company was also honored at CCA’s Corporate Visionary Honor Ceremony last November for inclusive
excellence in portrayals of LGBT individuals in promotional advertising.
One thing the LGBT community excels at it is praising those who help us. In addition to the CCA awards, GLAAD released a statement on Orbitz’s overall LGBT outreach: “We applaud the generous commitment Orbitz has made to GLAAD and the LGBT community over the years. They have been longtime advocates for fair and accurate portrayals of LGBT people, featuring them prominently within their ad campaigns…Orbitz stands as an excellent model of progressive corporate social responsibility, and we hope that its willingness to fight bigotry will inspire other companies to follow their example.”
The result of these marketing efforts, according to a Brandweek Q&A with Orbitz’s Chief Marketing Officer was a 12% growth in domestic gross bookings in the first three quarters of 2006 and larger overall growth than their leading competitor proving the value in not only LGBT marketing, but in doing so in a responsible and charitable way.
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Thanks for the insight there. If you’re considering doing business with Orbitz in the future, save a few bucks in the process (there are loads of sites offering orbitz coupons such as those at http://www.savings.com/m-Orbitz-coupons.html). Again – thanks for the excellent write up!