Destination council prepares for new era
By Dan Verel, Business Journal Staff Reporter
Recently approved district gives agency sorely needed funding
NAPA – The Napa Valley Destination Council will aggressively target more visitors to get them to the region at more crucial times – during the off-peak season and hopefully for longer stays in Napa Valley.
That was the message from Clay Gregory, chief executive officer of the destination council, as specific marketing strategies of its tourism business improvement district were unveiled last week at the Business Journal‘s Impact Napa conference.
“Our job is not to just bring more people to Napa Valley,” he said. “It’s to bring folks who appreciate Napa Valley wines, who want to stay in great hotels, who want to eat at our restaurants, go to our spas and hopefully spend days, if not weeks, here.”
Although already perhaps the most well-known wine destination in North America, Mr. Gregory said pure visitor volume alone would not be enough to boost the tourism economy that has suffered in the recession.
Clay Gregory
“We don’t want [visitors] when we don’t need them — we want them to come at the quieter times of the year and during the week. So our focus is to bring targeted folks in January through April and during the mid-week period,” Mr. Gregory said. “It’s not just a ‘more is better’ thing, it’s a very strategically thought-out thing, and I think that’s very important not only for the success of the economy, but it’s a community issue as well.”
The formation of the improvement district, known as a TBID, which was authorized in June by the Board of Supervisors, was the destination council’s prized project, as Mr. Gregory and numerous others lobbied extensively throughout the county to gain support of hoteliers and the various city councils that needed to approve of it before final county approval.
About 72 percent of hoteliers supported a 2 percent self-assessment that will be applied to visitors’ gross hotel bills. It is expected to raise as much as $4 million annually for destination marketing. By law, funds from the TBID cannot go toward a city’s general fund.
The destination council’s previous annual budget was approximately $437,000, a number that was dwarfed by other destinations such as Sonoma County or wine regions along the Central Coast.
Mr. Gregory highlighted the importance of tourism in the Napa Valley, noting that its economic impact is second only to the wine industry and it is a major sector of employment.
“Tourism is a $1.3 billion impact on Napa County’s economy,” he said. “It’s behind the wine industry but very important to the wine industry.” Approximately 17,000 to 18,000 people are employed within the industry.
“People think tourism only helps hotels and restaurants and wineries, but it helps 196 different industries in Napa County,” he said. “Virtually every business does better in Napa County when tourism does better.”
Nearly $125 million in transient occupancy tax is collected from tourism annually in Napa County. But Mr. Gregory said the region could no longer afford to rely on the TOT revenue, nor could it simply rest on the laurels of its prestige.
“We were really living on what is a great reputation but not doing anything to manage our own message — we were letting these other regions tell people what Napa Valley is about, and that’s not a good way to market anything,” he said. “You have to manage your own message, and that’s what we’ll be doing.”
Accordingly, the destination council will lay out specifically tailored marketing that suits Napa’s unique needs, Mr. Gregory said. For instance, whereas other destinations target conventions, Napa Valley will focus instead on smaller trade shows and select print advertising.
“The old bread and butter of destination marketing is bringing in conventions, but we don’t have a convention center and we don’t do conventions. But we do like small group business, so focusing on those and trade shows … is one of the things we will do,” he said.
Perhaps more important, the destination council will invest significantly more into web-based marketing, social media and mobile technology as means of marketing itself to an increasingly important demographic.
“We’re moving our marketing more and more toward Web and social media and mobile applications because one of the good news pieces of information is that we have a demographic that is 29-year-old heads of households that is the second-highest indexing group to come to Napa Valley,” Mr. Gregory said. “So that means our marketing has to move toward what the Millennials want.”
To see his slides and hear his talk, visit the Business Journal‘s Resources page for events online materials.
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I have only read the first paragraph and I wanted to respond. If your goal is to obtain more cliental, then become more cliental friendly. Paying more than $15 for a tasting is obsurd. No more please. The wine industry in general has lost perspective on what the core essence is of wine. A agricultral product meant for enjoyment by everyone. I am ranting now, no more.
by Jeramy Brown