Andrew LaurierChief Marketing Officer

Personal correspondence

A sailing notice is a promise

Chief Marketing Officer Canada

I market ferry crossings that island families, visitors and truck drivers plan their days around, so the notice, the fare and the promotion all have to hold.

In July 1992, at seventeen, I sold tickets in the terminal office of a cross-bay ferry on the Gulf of St. Lawrence. One afternoon the board behind me said only that the next sailing was delayed and that further information would follow. A woman with a hospital appointment on the far shore asked whether she should wait or drive around the bay, a journey of almost three hours. I could not tell her. The notice described the vessel's situation accurately and gave her nothing to decide with. I now lead marketing for the company that ran that crossing, and her question remains the test I apply to our communication.

Most of the people who read a ferry company's marketing already depend on the ferry. I would rather publish an uncomfortable fare, an uncertain return date or a reduced allocation in plain words than fill a season with a promise the car deck cannot keep. Confidence is spent in the hour before a sailing and earned back over several winters.

Company revenue
C$214M
2025, four ferry routes
Passenger crossings
1.9M
2025, with about 610,000 vehicles
Marketing budget
C$7.2M
2026, team of 36

I treat every fare, sailing notice and promotion as a promise that residents, visitors and carriers will use to plan a day.

I am chief marketing officer of Marelisse Ferries, a privately held operator based in Moncton, New Brunswick. We run seven vessels on four routes linking island and peninsula communities in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and eastern Quebec. In 2025 the company recorded C$214 million in revenue and carried 1.9 million passengers and about 610,000 vehicles. I lead 36 people across brand, digital sales, customer communications, pricing analysis and commercial-carrier accounts, with a marketing budget of C$7.2 million. Whether a vessel sails, and how, remains the decision of our masters and the operations team.

Our customers do not choose us the way they choose a hotel. For an island resident, the ferry is the road to work, school and hospital. For a trucking company, it is a fixed point in a delivery schedule and a driver's working hours. Visitors are the only group with obvious alternatives, which makes them the group a marketing department is most tempted to court. My job is to hold their interest without spending the confidence of people who have no other way across.

The three cases on this site describe decisions that cost us something: pausing a summer visitor campaign while a vessel was out of service, showing one all-in fare that looked higher than the old one, and holding deck space for carriers when tourists wanted it. In each I worked with operations, finance and community representatives who did not always agree with me. I record what we gave up as carefully as what improved.

Eleven weeks with a smaller relief vessel

When a gearbox fault withdrew our main island vessel in 2023, residents, medical travel and essential freight received priority, and a C$410,000 visitor campaign was paused. Resident confidence fell from 71 to 54 that August and returned to 68 by May 2024.

One fare at the first screen

On the cross-bay route we replaced a base fare, a monthly fuel surcharge and a booking fee with a single price of C$84 for a car and driver. Payment-step abandonment fell from 23 to 12 per cent, after six weaker weeks of online sales.

Deck space held for the island's suppliers

From 2022 we kept the equivalent of eight tractor-trailer spaces on nine peak daily sailings until 48 hours before departure. Thirty-seven carriers signed annual agreements, and commercial revenue grew 12 per cent over two seasons.

Current focus

I am preparing the customer and community sections of our proposal to renew the largest provincial service agreement in 2027: how fare changes, French- and English-language service and disruption commitments would be explained to the communities the route serves.

Conversations I welcome

I am open to a first independent board seat, or a committee role, with a Canadian transport authority, co-operative or regulated consumer service. I can offer about twenty-two days a year, subject to my chief executive's consent and a review of Marelisse's provincial contracts and suppliers.

The leadership record

Trusted with consequential decisions.

In the boardroom

  • Brisemarée Community FoundationVolunteer director · 2017–2023

Formation

  • Bachelor of commerce (marketing)Saint-Avreline University · 1997
Andrew told us that September he should have called us before the decision, not after. In twenty years of dealing with ferry managers, none had said that without being asked. The protocol we wrote together that winter is why the next summer felt different on the island.
Colette AmbrevauxChair of an island business association on a Marelisse Ferries route
The full record ↗

Contact

I am open to a first independent board seat, or a committee role, with a Canadian transport authority, co-operative or regulated consumer service. I can offer about twenty-two days a year, subject to my chief executive's consent and a review of Marelisse's provincial contracts and suppliers.

  • Board appointments
Write to Andrew Contact page