The Priceline Negotiator is back to continue his never-ending fight for choice, quality and the best travel deals in the universe. In his 10th year as celebrity spokesman for priceline.com® (Nasdaq: PCLN), William Shatner returns this week in the first installment of a new series of commercials based on the karate-chopping, hard-bargaining Priceline Negotiator character.
The spots promise to be bolder and better than ever, with more action, spectacular stunts and new sidekicks. The spots were created by Butler, Shine, Stern & Partners (BSSP), priceline.com’s San Francisco-based advertising agency. No financial details of the campaign were released.
To see the first spots, visit: http://www.priceline.com/promo/shatner_pcln_negotiator.asp
As The Negotiator, Mr. Shatner plays a character – part secret agent, part superhero – who uses his extraordinary martial arts and unusual-but-effective persuasion skills to negotiate the best possible travel deals on behalf of priceline.com customers. In one spot, The Negotiator plucks deadly blow-darts out of mid-air and fights off a dojo full of martial arts students to convince the master that he can find them as many special-deal hotel rooms as they need for their upcoming team trip. In another spot, one of The Negotiator’s new sidekicks, nicknamed NoFee, uses his incredible physical strength to demonstrate why a customer should not be paying airline ticket booking fees on another travel reservation service, when he can come to priceline.com and pay no booking fees on his published-price fares.
“Our first round of Negotiator spots in 2007 resonated very well with consumers,” said priceline.com Chief Marketing Officer Brett Keller. “They quickly set us apart from our competition and further solidified priceline as the value leader in the online travel world. As the Priceline Negotiator, William Shatner moves well beyond the traditional role of a spokesman and literally embodies the priceline brand and the deal-making attributes we stand for. Given the success of our first round, we’re excited to come back with a new series of commercials in which The Negotiator can entertain and further build the priceline.com brand.”
“A successful advertisement is an artful mix of humor and message,” said Mr. Shatner. “It entertains because it needs to grab attention, but it also informs. The Negotiator gives me a character, a vehicle if you will, where I can creatively blend those elements in a variety of different ways to get the desired result.”
According to BSSP, the Shatner/priceline.com partnership, sometimes referred to as his longest-running role, has been a big benefit to company and spokesman. “From the moment he first stepped onto the set, William Shatner gave priceline.com a personality,” said Mike Shine, BSSP’s co-Creative Director. “It provided priceline.com with instant credibility and recall. Typically, the initial benefits of a business/celebrity relationship fade after a short period of time. However, as Mr. Shatner’s career evolves and expands, he continues to bring fresh buzz and excitement to the priceline.com brand.”
William Shatner first appeared in a priceline.com advertisement in 1998. “Priceline.com was looking for a celebrity spokesperson who was trustworthy, associated with futuristic things, and had appeal across multiple generations,” said priceline.com’s Director of Advertising and Branding Cort Cunningham. “Mr. Shatner had all of those attributes. His persona combined with his new role gives him greater relevance for the brand.” Early priceline.com commercials featured a singing William Shatner twisting the words of ‘70s pop hits like “Age of Aquarius”, “Convoy” and “Two Tickets to Paradise” into odes to priceline.com and its money saving prowess. The ads were spoofed by Jay Leno, parodied on Saturday Night Live, lampooned in MAD Magazine, and even featured as a question on Jeopardy and Who Wants To Be A Millionaire.
Later on, priceline.com paired Mr. Shatner with his former co-star and friend Leonard Nimoy. That campaign focused on promoting priceline.com’s new product lineup that included published-price and Name Your Own Price travel products. In another series of spots, Mr. Shatner educated shoppers about the many travel choices they have when shopping at priceline.com.
Fans of Mr. Shatner and The Negotiator should check out his special MySpace page, http://www.myspace.com/thenegotiator. Visitors can download ringtones and screensavers, view Negotiator ads, edit family travel photos to include The Negotiator, play audio clips and read about The Negotiator’s favorite books, movies and more.
About Priceline.com® Incorporated
Priceline.com Incorporated (Nasdaq: PCLN) operates priceline.com, a leading U.S. online travel service for value-conscious leisure travelers, and Booking.com, a leading international online hotel reservation service. Priceline.com also operates Agoda.com, an Asian online hotel reservation service. In the U.S., priceline.com gives customers more ways to save on their airline tickets, hotel rooms, rental cars, vacation packages and cruises than any other Internet travel service. In addition to getting great published prices, leisure travelers can narrow their searches using priceline.com’s TripFilter advanced search technology, create packages to save even more money, and take advantage of priceline.com’s famous Name Your Own Price® service, which can deliver the lowest prices available.
Priceline.com believes that Booking.com is Europe’s largest and fastest growing hotel reservation service, with a network of affiliated Web sites. Booking.com operates in over 60 countries in 16 languages and offers its customers access to over 38,000 participating hotels worldwide.
Priceline.com also operates the following travel websites: Travelweb.com, Lowestfare.com, RentalCars.com and BreezeNet.com. Priceline.com also has a personal finance service that offers home mortgages, refinancing and home equity loans through an independent licensee. Priceline.com licenses its business model to independent licensees, including priceline mortgage and certain international licensees.