Contiki launches innovative Roadtrip with 13 YouTube celebrities
One life, one shot, make it count - no regrets! Continuing with a year of innovative digital launches, Contiki Holidays youth travel brand for 18-35s, is setting off on the ultimate adventure and taking 13 of YouTube's most popular personalities with them to the most iconic destinations in Europe. Now introducing The Roadtrip 2012 (ontheroadtrip.com) powered by Contiki, the travel industry's most epic journey across Europe from October 5th-15th, starting in Munich for Oktoberfest and heading to Hopfgarten, Venice, Paris and London. Not only is this inaugural trip one of the biggest YouTube events to happen this year, but it's the only way for fans to see their favourite YouTube personalities hang out and create incredible content together. The Roadtrip is made up of video bloggers from around the world, including the UK's Charlie McDonnell, and have a combined subscriber list of over 6 million with over one billion views. Each will be creating entirely unscripted videos in the first event of its kind. UK fans will get the chance to participate when the Roadtrip rolls into London on October 14th for the London Gathering.
The Roadtrip isn't just a regular trip around Europe, however - what's a journey across five countries without a little healthy competition? Contiki will be holding challenges where the vloggers will be able to win 3 free trips for their subscribers; fans across the world can then enter to win simply by following along and voting for their favourite YouTube personality on the Contiki Roadtrip website. The challenges are top secret to the vloggers and will be themed around the destinations they visit and the sights they see - this is still a Contiki trip, after all! And because YouTube is one of the most popular and accessible platforms for sharing online content globally, Contiki has arranged for local gatherings in each destination so that fans can come hang out with their favorite internet personalities and be a part of this monumental meeting of the world's most creative video content creators. This is the first time that a group of the world's most popular YouTube personalities have come together for an event of this kind and fans from all over the world have already started planning their trips to be a part of this innovative gathering.
"This year has been huge for Contiki establishing itself as the digital leader in the youth travel market, with two new online communities, a brand new iPhone app, Shout, and a number of sponsorships of well-known online personalities like Charlie McDonnell, Corey Vidal and Nadine Sykora," says Alexis Sitaropoulos, Group Marketing Director for Contiki Holidays. "We take tens of thousands of people across Europe every year and by partnering with these influential YouTuber's for such a ground-breaking event as The Roadtrip, we can take our incredible travel experiences, like gondola rides in Venice and white-water rafting in Austria, to a wider global audience."
Ready to hit the road? Fans can follow along for daily updates on youtube.com/contiki or ontheroadtrip.com and check out #theroadtrip2012 on Twitter to see behind-the-scenes video content and footage of the secret challenges. In the meantime, say hello to a few of the adventurous bloggers participating in The Roadtrip:
Charlie McDonnell of youtube.com/charlieissocoollike
Undoubtedly one of YouTube's hottest young entertainers, Charlie McDonnell is YouTube hot property. He's the UK's most subscribed blogger and was the first Brit to hit the one million subscriber mark. He currently has over 1,600,000 subscribers and 256,000,000 views.
Corey Vidal of youtube.com/ApprenticeA & youtube.com/ApprenticeEh
From his first video on YouTube, Corey was destined for big things. Since then, this multi-talented & determined Canadian has not just taught us how to dance like a hip hop star, but become one of the most successful and respected individuals in the industry as a network owner of 25 channels.
On 14th October from 12am - 2pm, the London YouTube Gathering will take place at Acklam Village Market on the famous Portobello Road in London. Fans will have the opportunity to mingle with the YouTubers, while listening to a hot up and coming live band The Approval, tucking into some street food at the food stalls and checking out the beauty stand.
For more information about Contiki, visit contiki.com.