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Just a few spots remain for the upcoming e-Marketing Insight Conference, being held in conjunction with DMAI's Destination Management & Marketing Institute, November 12-14 in Providence.
Founder Dave Serino has gathered some of the brightest voices in internet marketing for the event, including Erin Francis-Cummings, Dave Bratton, Tania Leichiter, Martin Stoll, Chris Adams and David Kirschner.
And, yeah...I'll be there too.
Hope to see you there!
And Happy Halloween...
Last week, we noted with sadness that Southwest Airlines lost money last quarter for the first time in 17 years (including, of course, the 4th Quarter of 2001).
Need another nugget to accept that this recession will be worse than the last? Addressing the Myrtle Beach Chamber's 70th Annual Meeting yesterday, pollster and author Frank Luntz shared new research that indicated that, last fall, 39% of American consumers indicated they planned to spend less on Holiday Gifts.
This year, 56% say they'll spend less.
Oh yeah...it's gonna be uglier.
And, if you get the chance to catch Frank in your town...do it. He's whip smart and wicked funny.
OK...I’m far from anal. But there’s just something unnatural about the ordering of sections on this directional sign at the (name withheld to protect the innocent) Fairgrounds' Grandstand.
What were they thinking? Or does this spell something dirty in a foreign language and somebody is laughing their ass off?
The "I'm a Mac" campaign has been brilliant...and, by all accounts, extremely effective. Microsoft has been oddly silent in its response until recently. Which I guess says a lot about the hubris of the enterprise.
Exceptional analysis of what has transpired since Microsoft decided to respond from the guys at Grokdotcom/FutureNow.
Well before Al Gore shamed Americans into considering the environment, hotels were encouraging guests to reuse sheets and towels. Nevermind that there was a fiscal advantage for them not to launder these items on a daily basis...it still created awareness of the problem and made some guests think twice.
But, all those little soaps and plastic mini-bottles of shampoo and lotion continue to make me shake my head in wonder at just how many landfills we're packing with these absolutely nonessential throw-away items. On a recent trip to Dickinson ND and the Strom Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, a group of us were discussing the opportunity to save money on these throw-aways while reducing the environmental footprint we leave with these unnecessary necessities.
Had the opportunity to stay at the way-cool hotelVetro in Iowa City last week...and they are several steps ahead. The industrial-looking locker room-style soap/shampoo dispensers would never work for an upscale hotel...so Vetro has partnered with the guys at The Soap Opera to develop customized bathing gels, conditioners and shampoos with evocative scents like Blackberry & Sage and Fig.
Good for the environment. Good for the bottom line. And, good for the Soap Opera as, if guests like what they just smeared over their body parts, they can buy it and take it home. Very cool.
Another weekend in another town.
There’s live music somewhere in this town...but damned if I can find it. And, sadly for this town (and the last town and the town before it), that means they forfeit the money that I had intended to leave behind for them.
It would seem to be such a little thing for the hotel to have the Weekend Go Guide tabloid at the front desk. But, of course, they don’t want me to venture out. They want me in their bar.
But, I don’t want to be in their bar. I want live music.
So, then, I guess it falls to the DMO to have an online listing of where I can find live music on the nights I’m in town. But, of course, they don’t. Most don’t.
Such a shame. Because beyond forfeiting my money, they’ve forfeited my future interest in ever returning for a getaway weekend. And telling my friends how great their town is.
Anyone who has been to Punxsutawney PA knows that the Bill Murray classic Groundhog Day wasn't filmed there. But that shouldn't keep you from going next February 2nd.
And those who have been to Woodstock IL (where the movie was filmed) are usually saddened to learn that the B&B in which Phil Connors keeps waking up isn't a B&B. It's just a house the producers used.
Until next summer. Gadling reports that the house has been purchased and the new owners are petitioning the City for the proper zoning to turn it into a B&B.
I'm sure they plan to...but if every alarm clock doesn't play "I Got You Babe" every morning, they've missed a huge a-ha moment.
The hit the travel industry endured during the last quarter of 2001 through 2002 was unlike any we had faced in decades. Through it all, Southwest Airlines was the only major carrier that continued to post a profit (and refuse to shred employees).
When I heard the news this week that Southwest posted its first quarterly loss in 17 years...I realized just how much worse this recession will be than the last one.
Much worse.
While we're talking websites...I just stumbled upon one of the most elegant and evocative destination websites I've ever seen. And, as you'd expect, it's NOT from a major market.
It's from Minnesota's Lutsen-Tofte Tourism Association. Population...ummm, roughly 500.
And, yeah, their destination website is better than yours.
When most of us in Wisconsin, Michigan and Minnesota wanna getaway, we
look north. How far north we go is a function of what we're lookin' to
do.
We love the Muskegon MI CVB website that attempts to add a fiscal consideration to our decision making process by offering a "Gas Savings Calculator" so that we can weigh the difference in going waaay north...to the cost to just go "Up North Enough."
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