More than $40 million is to be injected into Bermuda's tourism campaigns in a new three-year approach to boosting visitor numbers.

New York firms J. Walter Thompson and Lou Hammond and Associates were revealed yesterday as the Tourism Department's new advertising and public relations agencies.

Manhattan-based Thompson, which will run new ad campaigns across North America, will be backed by local partners Tango Multi-Media, which operates from Queen Street, Hamilton.

They sold themselves to the Tourism Review Board when they made winning presentations based on a projected annual budget of between $8.5 and $11 million.

Hammond, replacing Porter-Novelli as PR agents, will have an annual income of between $800,000 and $1 million.

Tourism Minister David Allen said the agencies would work with an annual direct marketing budget of $2.5 million. The sidelined funds have swollen Government's tourism coffers to over $40 million -- to pay for TV commercials, a range of media advertising and marketing campaigns around the world.

The objective is to bring more than 500,000 air travellers to Bermuda every year after last year's 27-year low of 368,756 arrivals.

J. Walter Thompson, one of 32 agencies to bid for the tourism contract, now replace DDB Needham, who withdrew in the early stages of bidding after ten years directing Bermuda's strategies.

And Mr. Allen said Thompson's appointment came after only the third agency review in Bermuda's tourism history.

Tourism campaign "This Government will do reviews on a more frequent basis,'' Mr. Allen said.

"But this campaign will have to last at least two to three years.'' He said fine details of the new advertising campaign -- likely to include a brand new slogan to attract visitors -- would be unveiled by the end of March in a "major lift-off'' involving events around Bermuda.

And he said the new advertising strategy would involve a reinvented campaign to revive tourism from Canada, recently affected by the unresolved Rebecca Middleton murder case.

Mr. Allen said the fresh approach meant targeting a "mind set'' rather than a stereotyped visitor.

And he said campaigns would spread further around the globe, although there would be a concentration in "core areas'' like the US Eastern Seaboard.

He added: "Potential visitors must be convinced they can find a vacation experience they can find nowhere else on the face of the planet, a place without billboards and neon lights, a place without McDonald's and superhighways.

"The sense of Bermuda's mystery, romance, the grandeur and drama of its physical location and the vibrancy of its unique people must be conveyed in the new campaign.'' Major advertising projects will take shape next month, he added, and be in full swing by June.

Mr. Allen also said Bermudians from all sectors would be central to the marketing projects, with their contribution being led by Tango Multi-Media.

And Tourism Board chairman Delaey Robinson added: "We are likely to see a broader spectrum of local input, from the creative right through to the production.'' Tango partner Mark Burgess told The Royal Gazette : "The concept, the presentation and the specifics are still in progress and cannot be divulged right now.

"Part of the creative brief would always be considering things like a new slogan. We are very excited to be involved as this is a totally new system.''