TORONTO -- Travellers flying out of Canada's largest airport will have access to a special parting gift: books and music available for free download.
Entertainment on Cloud 10 begins its rollout at Toronto's Pearson International Airport on Tuesday. The service is the latest offering in an ongoing partnership between the Greater Toronto Airports Authority -- which manages Pearson -- and American Express Canada.
"Doing something around entertainment was always one of the things that we both wanted to do," said David Barnes, vice-president of advertising and communications at American Express Canada.
While at Pearson, travellers will be able to visit a dedicated website to download select e-book titles and individual songs. The content is being provided by HarperCollins Canada and Sony Music Canada.
Travellers must be connected to airport Wi-Fi or use their own data plans to access the free materials.
Once they have downloaded content to their digital devices it is theirs to keep.
Barnes said while the service is currently specific to Pearson there is potential to expand depending on the willingness of other airports or venues to work with the credit card company.
Songs being featured on Entertainment on Cloud 10 include "Faith" by Calvin Harris, "Something in the Water" by Carrie Underwood, "Uptown Funk" by Mark Ronson and Hozier's "Take Me to Church."
Cory Beatty, marketing director at HarperCollins Canada, said six books will be available each month: e-book samplers which include excerpts of upcoming books, two classic titles and two best-selling releases.
The first run includes Giller Prize finalist "The Betrayers" by David Bezmozgis and "Us" by "One Day" author David Nicholls, and classic titles "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" and "The Great Gatsby."
Beatty said the publisher runs a lot of consumer giveaways to fans and on social media and is seeing the opportunity to offer free book downloads in a similar vein.
"We've spoken with each author directly and to communicate (to) them the marketing opportunity of offering this selection of books to consumers. We're really hoping that in the long run, this word of mouth will really pay off. ...
"We want people to know that these authors are terrific at what they do, to enjoy the books that they have, to tell their friends about that particular book, but also themselves to go and find past titles or upcoming titles by those authors."
