Costa Rica Tourism

Trailing your fingers through still water. Moving to the strums and beats of live music with someone you love. Breathing in the steam rising from a hot cup of freshly made coffee. These flashes of life encapsulate everything that pura vida exemplifies: simple living, gratitude, intentional actions and respect for all life. With so much daily chatter and clutter, finding time for these types of pura vida moments is more essential – but harder – than ever.

Through a first-of-its-kind partnership with Amazon and Whole Foods, Costa Rica Tourism sought to provide customers with an essential break when they least expected it. Known for its sustainability and eco-conscious initiatives, Costa Rica is a natural fit with the Whole Foods brand, which already carries many of the country’s products in its stores.

This organic brand connection was the basis of a fully integrated campaign, beginning with in-store digital displays at Whole Foods that offer customers enriching facts about the country, like how five volcanoes heat hundreds of hot springs for natural relaxation. Outside of stores, Volta electric-car charging station screens also feature brand messaging, showing users what a true recharge would look like for them in Costa Rica.

To reach Whole Foods customers who order home delivery, we designed a paper bag with stunning, hand-drawn depictions of Costa Rica centered around a towering volcano to provide them with an essential break when they might need it the most. Drawing on the ideas of gratitude, sustainability and enrichment, our hand-illustrated bag can be kept or given to others – reused as wrapping paper, colored and displayed, cut and collaged, or even used to help ripen fruit.

We even extended these Costa Rica–inspired moments into the homes of Amazon consumers, delivering pura vida breaks on digital and CTV. Through tableaus of people gathered around a table for a homemade meal or dancing to live music at an intimate club, viewers are transported into meaningful moments and invited to share in them, if just for a short time. Audio spots on Alexa-enabled audio devices inspire relaxation, prompting listeners to imagine themselves in a pura vida moment.

While small moments like these may not seem remarkable, it is the accumulation and intentionality of them that make a difference – not just in life, but also in marketing. Costa Rica is a place of ease and purpose, and the campaign needed to give something back to the consumer – even if it was just a calmer moment. Because for Costa Rica, every moment like this is essential.