Visit Lauderdale, the official destination marketing organization for Greater Fort Lauderdale, has launched “Never Lose Your Splash,” a new global brand campaign centered on the destination’s water-rooted identity. The campaign positions Greater Fort Lauderdale’s 24 miles of beaches and 300 miles of inland waterways as the through-line of the visitor experience — connecting dining, culture, and everyday spontaneity into a single brand promise.

The campaign debuted during CNN’s New Year’s Eve Live broadcast and rolls out across broadcast, digital video, audio, paid social, and out-of-home through 2026. The timing is strategic: Greater Fort Lauderdale is also the host city for IPW 2026, which brings the global travel trade directly to the destination this year.

Why it matters for DMOs

The rebrand is a useful case study in how a mid-sized DMO uses a major anchor event to reset its brand positioning at scale. Greater Fort Lauderdale has historically leaned on sun-and-sand messaging, and “Never Lose Your Splash” is a deliberate move to replace category-generic positioning with a distinct emotional territory — confidence, joy, and a sense of being most alive. That is the kind of repositioning work other destinations attempt in an RFP but rarely ship with this level of media weight behind it.

For practitioners, three things are worth watching. First, the launch pairing with CNN NYE is a reminder that cultural moments still outperform trade-channel media for reach-driven brand launches. Second, the creative is structured as a platform, not a campaign — meaning it can flex across paid, owned, and partner channels without rebuilding for each use case. Third, the campaign is arriving ahead of IPW 2026, which gives Visit Lauderdale a built-in secondary audience of international buyers and journalists who will shape the destination’s global perception for years.

Read the full campaign launch on the Visit Lauderdale newsroom.

Photo by Lance Asper on Unsplash