It's been a good week for ...
Nessie
The Loch Ness Monster is to star in a new £2m advertising campaign to promote Scotland to foreign visitors. The initiative comes not from from VisitBritain, whose mandarins have obviously noticed that Scotland was a lucrative place in 2014. Even Clyde, the couthie Commonwealth Games mascot, couldn't turn them off.
The new campaign aims to increase the number of international tourists to Loch Ness and Inverness by 50,000 over the next four years. That region already draws some 200,000 tourists a year, and I'd hazard that has more to do with the sheer bonniness of the place, rather than a mythical creature in need of a chiropractor lurking in the depths of the loch.
So, all that cash resting on the shoulders of a beast whose existence is questionable. I suppose that's all part of the smoke and mirrors of marketing, and bigging up the merest shadow of opportunity.
Loch Ness will surely bubble now the spin cycle is switched to full power.
It's been a bad week for ... tartan tat
Secretly, we're proud of the shortbread-tin image. But we shouldn't say it out loud.
Sadly, no-one told the Scottish Government, which has just spent 40 grand on pictures to promote all things Scottish. Predictably, all the old chestnuts are there: kilted bagpipers in front of the Forth Road Bridge, Arbroath smokies and ceilidh dancers, presumably also wearing kilts.
These will be the first images of Scotland to welcome visitors to the country, as part of a new quarter-million pound advertising drive.
Ministers have spent more than £40,000 on photography as part of the new campaign, with another £217,000 to go on advertising space in Scotland's airports. Pictures depicting Scotch whisky, seafood and a community windfarm are also among 10 images to be used.
The campaign, which sees some of the photos accompanied by the highly imaginative "Welcome to Scotland", was not well-received by some,.
Tory tourism spokesperson Murdo Fraser MSP said: "I am not sure that the Scottish Government's latest ad campaign represents value for money or is particularly innovative. Scotland has much to offer and the Scottish Government should not be afraid to think outside the box when spending substantial sums on advertising."
Perhaps Clyde should dust down his CV.
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