Eyeing strong growth in the Gulf market, Japanese watch brand Citizen has rolled out an extensive advertising campaign to strengthen its corporate branding. The company has taken up nine various locations in Dubai and Sharjah international airports with JCDecauxMEA, the exclusive advertising concessionaire at the airports. Panels branded by Citizen include lift wraps, light boxes and signage outside the terminal buildings.

“The passenger profile of Dubai and Sharjah airports matches with our target group and we received several enquiries of our Eco-Drive model advertised in the two airports during the campaign,” says Mohamed Faisal, Sales Manager of Citizen Watches Gulf Co. “These campaigns went very well with other media mix. It’s also encouraging to see that sales at Dubai Airport Terminal 1 Duty Free, where we branded the boutique lifts, saw a rise of 15% during the campaign.”

Yoann El Jaouhari, Sales and Marketing Director of JCDecaux Middle East, added: “Passenger traffic in both Dubai and Sharjah airports consistently shows [a] remarkable surge. Thanks to the thriving environment, Dubai Duty Free in particular recorded the highest sales volume among all duty free outlets worldwide in 2009, making the area very popular among our travel retail clients. Citizen is certainly one of the foremost brands. While the airports are ideal for brand building, we are very pleased to see the bustling flow of passengers also contributes to a sales boost to our clients like Citizen. This proves the airports is a very cost effective media, which is particularly crucial under the current economic situation.”