Tina Sums Up The Four Elements of a Tourism Campaign

Tonight we met a young family who live just outside Copenhagen’s city center. The house was a perfect metaphor, in some ways, for how the people here live. Small, compact, cozy and well designed.

Tina Baungaard Jensen, who works for Visit Denmark as their international press officer, told us the goals of the country’s marketing, summed up in four words: Simple. Pure. Design. Perfection. The design aspects were everywhere in her little three-story house: Elegant orange chairs with a perfect curve, designed by Jacobsen. A tiny black, round wood stove, only about two feet wide, with a full glass face and a little log storage area below the firebox. Wooden exposed beams in a bedroom that added a natural and outdoorsy look.

The appliances in the house were all compact, much smaller than anything you’d see in the U.S. In the finished basement, a tiny corner bathroom with a Liliputian sink in a corner. Tidy stacked halfpint washer/dryer. The small yard had a little greenhouse, and inside, herbs stood ready to pick for cooking, and a tree produced a berry called hyldebomst that Tina made into a refreshing drink, that tasted like lemonade and apple juice.

Her children were delighted to welcome the strange-talking guests from America. Her five-year-old boy named Asgar showed us his bunk beds and his three-year-old brother happily proclaimed ‘good night’ in English, (it’s nearly the same in Danish, unbeknowst to us). Tina’s roast chicken was free-range, and the aoli sauce was a savory dip for the breadsticks. It was a treat to be able to have a family meal here, and learn what daily life is like for a typical Danish household.