A story needs no introduction …

… but as we all learned from a very early age, it does need a beginning, a middle and an end – much like the story of the marketing campaign for the Montreux Palace’s new restaurant. This was not just a standard press release, but a fascinating story told by Diction’s Storytelling team about a magical midsummer night in which the idea for the restaurant was born.

Le client

The Fairmont Le Montreux Palace is one of Switzerland’s most prestigious hotels, and part of the exclusive Swiss Deluxe Hotels group. The five-star luxury hotel on the banks of lake Geneva is a home from home for international stars and notables from across the globe, especially during the world-famous Montreux Jazz Festival. A traditional marketing campaign would not do justice to the hotel’s exclusive ambience – its story needs to be told.

The task

In the summer of 2015, the gourmet restaurant MP’s BAR & GRILL opened at the Fairmont Le Montreux Palace. But there was no big advertising campaign to mark the event; instead the Diction team was tasked with creating something altogether more interesting – a single compelling text that would form the entirety of the marketing material. he text was to be written as a press release that not only contained information about the restaurant’s architecture, design and cuisine, but which also told the fascinating story of the historic building and its famous patrons.

And this was a story that was to be told the world over and read by hotel guests, Montreux locals, restaurant critics and connoisseurs of fine dining from across the globe.

Diction’s team were thus faced with the challenge of writing an informative text that also captures the reader’s imagination and entices them into the restaurant.

The solution

We decided to tell the story of the extraordinary events that inspired the concept for MP’s BAR & GRILL – a story of a quite remarkable evening during which the hotel’s staff were dispatched through the Montreux night to somehow source the very finest local ingredients for an impromptu midnight meal for one of the hotel’s world-famous guests. The reader is taken on a remarkable journey through the streets of Montreux and the hotel’s corridors and hallways, and finally up on its roof, where the scene had been set for a sumptuously exquisite midsummer night’s dinner. And they can also become part of the story themselves, as the atmosphere, interior concept and menu for MP’s BAR & GRILL are all inspired by the events that took place during this now legendary night.

The most compelling stories are written by those who were there to experience them first hand. Daniele Pantano, head of Diction Storytelling, spent two days at the hotel, soaking up the atmosphere, walking in the footsteps of its staff and guests, taking inspiration from the restaurant’s future location and, of course, sampling the cuisine. The sensational story was first drafted in English by Diction’s copywriters before being translated into French and German, with our in-house translators ensuring it reads like an original in both languages.

The result: The story of this extraordinary fairy-tale evening in Montreux had people throughout Switzerland and across the world talking about the new restaurant, and contributed to a hugely successful opening. An expensive advertising campaign is not always the best marketing strategy – a simple story can often be so much more effective.

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