Beazley was founded to do insurance differently, seeing each day as an opportunity to challenge convention and explore new possibilities. Since then, the specialist provider of risk insurance and reinsurance solutions has built a marketing approach rooted in creativity, curiosity and bold ideas.
This spirit was perfectly embodied when Georgina Peters-Venzano, chief marketing officer of Beazley, turned a milestone moment of 40 years of operations in Europe, 20 in North America and 20 in Asia into more than a “birthday” celebration. Rather than simply marking the company’s heritage, she transformed it into a story that connected emotionally with the people who drive Beazley’s business.
Equipped with the striking ‘Bowler Bus’ and a CGI-powered social media campaign, “Around the World in 80 Years” brought the brand to life through experiences that were human, bold and memorable – from personalised, face-to-face meeting with brokers, to surprising and delighting audiences online.
At a time when insurance marketing is increasingly about experiences, emotion and differentiation, Peters-Venzano’s campaign showed how Beazley continues to take a refreshingly different approach to insurance, and highlighted why she earned our 2025 Financial Promoter of the Year award.
An idea born from adventure
To celebrate Beazley’s combined 80 years in business, Peters-Venzano says she found her inspiration in the unlikely place of the pages of Jules Verne’s “Around the World in Eighty Days.”
“We were inspired by the adventurous spirit of Phileas Fogg and thought, why not mark our journey with something just as bold? That’s how ‘Around the World in 80 Years’ was born,” she says.
What began as a spark of inspiration quickly evolved into a global marketing concept with clear commercial intent. Peters-Venzano set out to turn a simple celebration into a unifying platform that could connect Beazley’s story with the people shaping its future.
She notes that from the outset, she knew it couldn’t be another corporate anniversary campaign. It needed to be more creative, more unexpected, and above all, more personal.
This is because in an increasingly competitive financial services landscape, she knew a conventional playbook wouldn’t deliver cut-through and that advertising, events and digital outreach alone wouldn’t be enough to make an impact.
When the concept came together, North America was chosen as the launchpad for the campaign, which Peters-Venzano says was a “natural choice”.
“It’s a huge part of our growth plans, and we saw a real opportunity to deepen relationships and grow our brand presence,” she says. “Plus, it gave us the perfect stage to test our boldest ideas and show what Beazley is all about.”
A campaign with purpose
While “Around the World in 80 Years” was rooted in celebrating Beazley’s milestone, its purpose reached far beyond marking time. Instead, the campaign set out to show what truly sets the company apart: a brand built on bold thinking, meaningful impact and a distinct way of doing business.
Peters-Venzano explains that while growth remains a goal for every organisation, Beazley’s ambition goes beyond scale. The firm wants to grow by making a difference in an era defined by accelerating risk.
“From cyber threats and technological transformation to climate change and geopolitical instability—the world is facing challenges that demand bold, intelligent solutions. After all, it’s the fear of risk that limits creativity and stifles progress,” she says.
With that mindset, the campaign was designed to extend Beazley’s reach across North America, Europe and the APAC region and open doors to new buyers while deepening relationships with broker partners.
Across every element, Peters-Venzano sought to bring Beazley’s core value of “Being Bold” to life. By challenging sector norms and leaning into creativity, the campaign sought to turn the company’s positioning of “Insurance. Just different.” from a tagline into a tangible experience.
Bold ideas brought to life
Bringing the campaign, and its strategic objectives, to life came by multiple channels. The first was the ‘Bowler Bus’, a striking pink vehicle topped with Beazley’s signature bowler hat.
It travelled across North America to meet brokers and clients face-to-face, creating opportunities for meaningful interaction in a sector that often relies on formality and distance.
Each stop was shaped around the people Beazley was meeting, such as their markets, challenges and priorities. Rather than following a fixed agenda, events were designed to encourage open discussion, with details like thoughtful merchandise and considered design making the experience memorable.
“The Bowler Bus was such a fun idea – and it worked,” Peters Venzano says. “It was cost-effective, high-impact, and full of personality.”
The inclusion of the bowler hat was particularly significant, she adds. As the symbol has been at the heart of Beazley’s brand identity since the 2022 refresh, taking it across the country on top of the bus enabled Beazley to bring the company’s heritage and personality to life.
“It is a symbol of our professionalism, heritage and brings that little touch of quirkiness,” she says. “After all, the business begun with just two entrepreneurs in an empty room with a couple of desks and a hat stand with a simple bowler hat.”
To extend the campaign beyond the road, Beazley turned to CGI. The creative team developed a series of imaginative visuals that reinterpreted global landmarks through the brand’s perspective, which were then posted across social media platforms.
Peters-Venzano explains that the posts were designed to capture attention and spark engagement while the use of CGI allowed the posts to connect on a human level. Instagram, in particular, was a key area for growth because Beazley could show its personality and relatability, she adds.
The creative team also tapped into the universal appeal of curiosity and dropped a trail of location-themed CGI moments across the social channels. According to Peters-Venzano, the posts created a visual breadcrumb trail intended to keep viewers guessing and engaged. First-person perspectives and ground-level videography were used deliberately, avoiding generic aerial stock footage
Highlights of the social campaign included posts with Beazley branding on New York’s Times Square screens, a branded hot air balloon near Toronto’s CN Tower, Chicago’s Cloud Gate wearing the Beazley bowler hat and an oversized bowler hat atop a hat stand along LA’s Sunset Boulevard.
But for Peters-Venzano, a particular standout moment was the CGI pink rubber ducks in Chicago. The visuals made it appear as though giant ducks were floating along the Chicago River, referencing the city’s annual ‘Ducky Derby.’ The post went on to become Beazley’s highest-performing post in 2025 to date.
“There were so many [proud moments], but one that stands out is the CGI ducks in Chicago. It was playful, unexpected and it blew our engagement benchmarks out of the water. Seeing something so quirky resonate so strongly – that was a proud moment,” she says.
By combining the physical presence of the ‘Bowler Bus’ with digital CGI content, the campaign delivered experiences that were bold, human and personal – qualities that Peters-Venzano sought to achieve.
“Encompassing these three vital qualities meant showing up in unexpected ways. So, we hit the road in a bus, met brokers face-to-face, and used CGI to spark curiosity online. Every detail was designed to feel real, relatable and a little bit surprising,” she says.
“All aboard!”
Bringing a campaign of this scale to life required more than a bold idea, it also demanded internal engagement that matched its ambition. Fortunately, Peters-Venzano understood that securing buy-in from across the business would be critical to its success.
“Getting buy-in was all about inclusion. We held open brainstorms, kept everyone updated through internal channels and even got our CEO on the bus!” she says.
Colleagues were also encouraged to become ambassadors for the campaign, sharing content on their own social channels to amplify its reach and build excitement across the business.
Creative ideas weren’t confined to the leadership team. Peters-Venzano explains that input came from across the marketing team, with concepts sourced through open brainstorming sessions and then refined into a cohesive visual narrative that could be executed across multiple markets.
To engage the wider company, Beazley leveraged every internal channel available, such as Weekly News and divisional updates to the intranet. This ensured employees understood the campaign and could act as advocates externally.
Fun and interactive initiatives further strengthened engagement. For example, the ‘Traveling Bowler Hat Challenge’ sparked creative competition while adventure-themed social hours across offices worldwide raised awareness. Throughout these initiatives, social impact activities were woven in to reflect another one of Beazley’s core values to do the right thing, she adds.
Through this combination of inclusion, creativity and interactive engagement, Peters-Venzano ensured that the campaign wasn’t just something the marketing team delivered, but a shared experience that energised the entire business.
Going the extra mile
Just as the campaign honoured Beazley’s history, objectives and iconic symbols, it also remained committed to sustainability, which represents one of the company’s core pillars of operations.
“Social impact was woven into everything—from the bus’s sustainable design to school workshops in London. We wanted the campaign to do more than just promote Beazley—we wanted it to inspire, educate and give back. That’s a big part of who we are as a brand,” Peters-Venzano says.
On the environmental front, the Bowler Bus itself was designed with sustainability in mind. Three solar panels on the roof helped recharge the generator, while six industrial batteries on board powered the bus’s systems. Combined, these measures saved 1892.34 tonnes of emissions or the equivalent of taking an SUV off the road for six months, according to Peters-Venzano.
The campaign also created meaningful social impact closer to home, she says. In London, Beazley used the journey as a platform to engage local schools, introducing students to the insurance industry and exploring career paths they might never have considered.
Age-appropriate, sustainable merchandise, including rubber ducks, made the sessions memorable, giving students practical exposure to a sector they often perceive as abstract or outdated.
She adds that across North America, the campaign sought to foster positive local connections as well. Beazley partnered with trusted community suppliers to provide food and coffee for everyone the team met along the way. These small but meaningful gestures aimed to turn every visit into a shared moment rooted in local pride to create “warmth and hospitality that can’t be manufactured”.
The initiative also tied back to Beazley’s heritage and values as Peters-Venzano notes that it echoed the origins of the insurance market itself with Edward Lloyd’s coffee house, where merchants, shipowners and underwriters once gathered over a cup of coffee to exchange ideas, share risks and build the foundations of the industry.
“By taking that spirit on the road we showed that while Beazley is now a global company, our strength still lies in creating spaces where people come together to listen, to learn and to imagine what’s possible when we share a cup and start a conversation,” she says.
Stories and stats
The campaign’s reach was impressive by any metric. Across the US alone, Beazley engaged with 2,000 brokers, hosted 62 broker and client events, made 33 stops in 15 cities across 10 states and saw a measurable increase in quote activity.
But Peters-Venzano emphasises that the real impact went far beyond numbers. In an industry often driven by metrics, the campaign demonstrated the power of human-centric experiences.
“We looked beyond the usual metrics. The real magic was in the stories — brokers sharing how the experience made them feel, families bonding over our merchandise, and the surprise and delight we saw on social media. That emotional connection was the true measure of success,” she explains.
The social media response reinforced this emotional resonance, with a flood of positive comments highlighting how the campaign’s creativity and personality captured attention.
Industry recognition followed as well as judges for this year’s Financial Promoter Awards praised the ambition and execution of Peters Venzano’s work.
One judge remarked: “The submission goes beyond the organisational objectives — there are so many layers to the campaign, from the mileage and energy usage of the bus to the history of Beazley. Everything leads back to a different part of the Beazley story and how it supports its clients and the wider world.”
Another added: “A bus, CGI and phenomenal experiential – what more can you ask for?”
By combining scale, creativity and a human touch, “Around the World in 80 Years” proves that impact in insurance can be as much about stories, relationships and experiences as it can about numbers.
The next stop
Even though the Bowler Bus will retire after its exploration of North America, Peters-Venzano says there’s more fun planned, with activations coming across the UK, Europe and Singapore in 2026.
She adds that while the bus may have stopped, the campaign as a whole reflects the wider shift in marketing in the sector, particularly around the focus on human connections and bold activations.
“Marketing in (re)insurance is shifting. It’s no longer just about information – it’s about emotion, storytelling and connection,” she says. “At Beazley, we’re embracing that shift and looking ahead to more bold, creative campaigns that build trust and spark conversation.”
Although the campaign is still underway, Peters-Venzano’s work has already made its mark, earning her the title of Financial Promoter of the Year at our 2025 awards and showing how creativity, human connection and bold thinking can drive meaningful engagement in a traditionally conservative industry.
In combining scale, creativity and a human touch, “Around the World in 80 Years” serves as more than a campaign. Instead, it marks a chapter in an ongoing journey that proves what modern marketing in insurance can achieve and signals the exciting next chapter for Beazley’s brand.