State has the ingredients, but culinary tourism still evolving

CAPITAL GAINS: There were 400 attendees for the Eat Drink RI 2015 Grand Tasting, at which more than 50 companies and restaurants showcased their culinary offerings. The event took place in the grand ballroom of the Providence Biltmore. / COURTESY EAT DRINK RI
CAPITAL GAINS: There were 400 attendees for the Eat Drink RI 2015 Grand Tasting, at which more than 50 companies and restaurants showcased their culinary offerings. The event took place in the grand ballroom of the Providence Biltmore. / COURTESY EAT DRINK RI

To most over the age of 20, the idea of a “three-hour tour” brings back television images of Gilligan in a bucket hat, stranded on a deserted island.

But Cindy Salvato’s three-hour Savoring Rhode Island tour is decidedly different, and more fulfilling. Participants are ferried around Providence, or to hotspots throughout Rhode Island, to taste and experience the local food scene that has been repeatedly recognized by national food publications and travel websites as being among the nation’s best.

“What we’ve seen is that culinary tourism is a driving force with all the foodies. … If you can get people in any situation around food, it’s always a hit,” said Salvato.

Savoring Rhode Island’s success since its 2001 launching is one example of a potentially lucrative food-tourism industry in the state. Eat Drink RI has actively promoted culinary tourism locally for several years. And there’s even a Culinary Arts Museum at Johnson & Wales University, one of the nation’s pre-eminent training grounds for chefs and hospitality-industry specialists.

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But while there is ample evidence of the state’s prowess as a culinary center and the contributions of the overall hospitality industry to the local economy, measurements of its impact on tourism are limited.

Vermont, for example, has aggressively sought to establish and market itself as a regional culinary-tourism powerhouse.

But neither the R.I. Commerce Corp. nor its predecessor have gathered comparable data to attempt to match or exceed other states’ offerings. Commerce RI does, however, intend to include it in an evolving statewide tourism marketing campaign.

“It’s tough to compartmentalize the food scene, and the challenge is to get past the gut instinct that culinary tourism is going to a restaurant; it is, but it’s so much more,” said Darin Early, Commerce RI chief operating officer.

Salvato was among the first to recognize that locally.

HILL TOURS

As a pastry-chef instructor at Johnson & Wales, she often led tours of Federal Hill for her students as an incentive for perfect class attendance. This small token of appreciation was the seedling for what would become Rhode Island’s first culinary-themed tourism company when, in 2001, Salvato gave up her career as a professional chef and opened Savoring Rhode Island.

“[These tours] were always something the students looked forward to, and I decided to open them up to the public. Before I knew it, I was going full-tilt,” she said.

Every weekend, and occasional weekdays, for the past 15 years, Salvato, the business’ sole proprietor, has toured locals and tourists alike around her favorite food haunts. With each repeat visit to local institutions like Scialo Bros. Bakery and Gasbarro Wines, she has fostered strong relationships with the proprietors.

When she first started, Salvato remembers not a lot of people knew about culinary tourism.

“The whole idea was new to a lot of people on Federal Hill,” she said of the first year, when there were only six tours scheduled.

The following year Salvato’s tours quadrupled. She played such an integral role during the state’s culinary-tourism infancy that in October 2014 the Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau named her “Member of the Year.”

A teacher at heart, Salvato – a finalist for the 2003 International Association of Culinary Professionals Cooking Teacher of the Year award – carried over her passion for teaching to her new students: Rhode Island’s culinary tourists.

Economically, the tours benefited everyone involved, explained Salvato. She found a new calling, the restaurants, bakeries and retail stores saw sales increase, and tourists discovered new venues and learned about unique, local produce.

Nationally, culinary tourism is seen as both growing and lucrative.

The American Culinary Traveler Report found that 77 percent of U.S. leisure travelers, just over 136 million people, are culinary tourists, an increase from 40 percent in 2006 to 51 percent in 2013.

The Ontario Culinary Tourism Alliance, a nonprofit organization which promotes culinary tourism worldwide, defined the industry as: “any tourism experience in which one learns about, appreciates, and/or consumes food and drink that reflects the local, regional or national cuisine, heritage and culture.”

A 2012 University of Florida report estimated tourist expenditures on food services was $201 billion in the United States, representing 23.5 percent of all travel income that year.

Locally, JWU’s presence gives Providence and the state an engine to help grow a local industry. The school boasts alumni that include celebrity chefs Emeril Lagasse and Michelle Bernstein, and a host of other renowned culinary specialists.

The university offers a tourism and hospitality-management degree that includes a class called “Food and Beverage in the Hospitality Industry.” The class, said Richard Gutman, director of the university’s Culinary Arts Museum, “links food, wine and tourism and builds upon their significance in the culture of various places.”

In addition, there are study-abroad programs students can participate in and a familiarization-tour project in which students plan a culinary-themed tour of a foreign destination, including a budget and promotion of the event, said Gutman.

While the Providence museum does not directly promote the state’s culinary-tourism industry, it does educate the public about food-related Rhode Island history, explained Gutman.

Gutman had his first taste of culinary tourism in 1988 when he visited New Zealand and participated in a farm stay. While there he and his family witnessed a hop harvest.

“It was a great example of something we did because we were going to an unusual [destination] and wanted to get a look at how to get into the culture and rhythm of a faraway place,” he said.

In Rhode Island, and Providence especially, Gutman believes there is a similar “insatiable demand” to learn and be involved in the culinary process, whether it’s in the kitchen or on the farm.

“[This interest] is good for the economy because it has that spider-web connectivity that spreads and helps in ways that might be unexpected,” he said. For example: when a restaurant expands to open a retail store or when farms begin to offer tours and vineyards open for public tastings.

ALL THE INGREDIENTS

While proponents believe Rhode Island possesses all the necessary ingredients for a thriving culinary-tourism industry, the state has little direct data of its local economic impact to date.

“This specific figure has not been tracked in previous years. Currently, we are conducting familiarization tours [with bloggers and journalists] that focus on the culinary industry… [and] are reviewing our data tracking, as well as what metrics we will track going forward,” said R.I. Commerce Corp. spokeswoman Kayla Rosen.

What local data is available paints a tantalizing, if unfocused, picture of an industry brimming with potential.

Rosen said the state has tracked “visitor food-revenue impact” and found that 40 percent of all dining in Rhode Island is done by visitors.

A 2014 Rhode Island Tourism Satellite Account report, compiled by Global Insight, found tourism and hospitality was the state’s fourth-largest industry in 2013, with just over 19 million people visiting the state and 66,616 jobs supported by the industry which generated approximately $5.9 billion, 20 percent of which was spent on food.

There is also no official definition used by the state to identify and measure culinary tourism specific to the Ocean State. It instead relies on the “industry standard” of “the pursuit of unique and memorable eating and drinking experiences,” as outlined by the International Culinary Tourism Association.

According to the National Restaurant Association, sales at Rhode Island’s 2,786 eating and drinking establishments will reach $2.3 billion in 2016. The same report found the culinary industry supports 57,000 jobs, or 12 percent of the state’s workforce, a number estimated to grow by more than half in a decade. The report from 2014 found the Rhode Island industry sustained 50,600 jobs at 2,726 locations and earned an annual $2 billion in sales, while the following year there were 53,100 culinary-industry employees at 2,786 institutions, with no change in annual sales.

The number of culinary tourists to visit Rhode Island has also not been tracked by the state, however the Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau contracts hotel room nights for major events and considers this a comparable statistic. The number of room nights contracted for the May 2015 Tedeschi Food Shops Conference, July 2015 American Cheese Society Annual Conference and July 2016 United States Personal Chefs Association’s 2016 Annual Conference – the most recent, major culinary-themed events in Providence – were 271 room nights, 1,942 and 298 respectively.

Prior to 2015 there were fewer room nights contracted for Rhode Island-based culinary events. The May 2013 Tedeschi Food Shops Conference contracted 256 room nights, the June 2013 Sustainable Agriculture Food Systems Funders 2013 SAFSF contracted 295 room nights and September 2013 Taste Trekkers event contracted 32 room nights. According to the PWCVB, there were no culinary-related events in 2011 and 2012.

“The culinary offerings of a destination are now such a large part of a traveler’s decision-making process, but this particular delegate that comes to a conference on food culture, culinary offerings and its advancement is a great customer to bring into our market,” said Thomas Riel, PWCVB vice president of sales. “They’ll go off the beaten path to find the best of the best – we love that kind of customer.”

In Newport and Bristol counties, in a year-over-year comparison the statewide 1 percent meal and beverage tax increased by more than 9 percent in 2015 compared to the previous year. There was a 10 percent increase in the lodging tax, representing a giant leap in culinary tourism traffic. Previously the region had experienced a 5.6 percent increase in 2014 and 3.5 percent in 2013.

In comparison, Providence, which has consistently received the largest share of state funds from the meal and beverage tax over the last three years, saw a 3.8 percent year-over-year increase in 2015, a 4.1 percent increase in 2014 and a 2.5 percent increase in 2013 – which represents growth, but at a slower pace.

EVERYONE HAS TO EAT

David Dadekian, owner and founder of Eat Drink RI, knew the state’s culinary industry was under-represented when he founded the all-local, culinary-themed media outlet in 2010. Since then he has helped bring attention to the state’s food scene through an annual four-day festival highlighting the best Rhode Island chefs, restaurants and artisanal foods.

Tourists come to Rhode Island for many reasons, said Dadekian, but everybody has to eat.

“They’re going to impact our restaurants and culinary shops and buy local goods; it’s included with every tourist. No matter what they come here for, they interact with food,” he said.

Vermont has focused its food-tourism industry around “agri-tourism,” which prioritizes connections between producers of hallmark Vermont products, said Meghan Sheridan, executive director of Vermont Fresh Network, a nonprofit cultural-tourism organization that fosters relationships between farmers, chefs and consumers with the goal of eating more locally grown food.

“If you’re coming to Vermont and you’re interested in cheese, you’re most likely interested in beer, wine and good food too,” said Sheridan of the multiple culinary avenues marketed to tourists.

Sheridan fosters these relationships and markets “farmer-approved chefs.” When Vermont Fresh Network was formed in 2010, Sheridan remembers culinary tourism still being in its infancy locally.

“We realized we already had the relationships and we could capitalize on the interest of travelers to draw them in to all the farm and food activities we were already trying to elevate,” said Sheridan of the organization’s “aha” moment.

In 2013, according to a report co-sponsored by the University of Vermont and the state’s Department of Tourism and Marketing, 12.8 million person trips were made to Vermont, 39 percent of which were visits for food and drink experiences, representing the third-highest priority for travelers to the state. Between June 2012 and February 2014, culinary tourists to Vermont tended to be younger, with 44 percent under 50 years old.

That same year visitors spent $2.49 billion in Vermont, of which $400 million was spent at restaurants and bars, second only to the $430 million spent on lodging.

“There’s only 600,000 of us in Vermont and we can be dedicated to our local food system, but we need the tourists to sustain it,” said Sheridan of the industry’s local importance.

Even though detailed statistics of the economic impact of Rhode Island’s culinary-tourism industry have not been kept on the state level, said Early, the industry will be an integral part of the statewide marketing campaign.

As a recent transplant to Rhode Island, Early was pleasantly surprised by the quality and diversity of the state’s food scene, calling it an asset that “clearly differentiates it from other states.”

At Commerce RI, “There always has been a plan to leverage off of culinary tourism and have that be something that is a key pillar of our marketing strategy,” he said. “It’s fairly well-known we have a foodie scene here, but to reinforce that in the minds of touring consumers is key.”

The best way to capitalize on what already exists in Rhode Island, explained Early, is to continue marketing the state as a culinary destination through traditional channels and social media, while also promoting local businesses and chefs through chambers of commerce and industry spokespeople.

“The state’s role here is to pull those together and provide a full, immersive experience of Rhode Island’s culinary scene,” said Early.

In particular, he thinks the new campaign would greatly benefit from prominently featuring Rhode Island’s farm-to-table movement, food-truck culture and burgeoning microbrewery community as culinary draws.

Robert Burke, owner of Providence’s Pot au Feu restaurant, agrees that in the Ocean State, culinary tourism is more than just a great dining experience at a nice restaurant.

“Because we’re so small and so close you have this wonderful sense of the entire food chain, an experience many people don’t have in the Jersey suburbs or a Manhattan condo,” he said of the farms, vineyards and fishing opportunities included in the Rhode Island culinary-tourism industry.

Burke, founder of the city’s Independence Trail tourist attraction, has long complained the state could do more to market its assets. He believes culinary tourism, if promoted properly, could be a welcome economic boost to the state.

“When we build culinary tourism, we employ Rhode Islanders who are most in need of a job. It’s the right thing to do, on so many levels,” he said.

“The state has ignored the potential for culinary tourism for decades and their efforts have been completely inept and that’s demonstrated by this latest round of branding. …We all know from looking at the expenditures people make on $75,000 kitchens, trips to culinary destinations around the world and the popularity of culinary media – it’s very clear this is a giant opportunity for Rhode Island and one that, yet again, the state has completely missed,” he said.

Karl J. Guggenmos, dean emeritus of Johnson & Wales, agrees Rhode Island is ripe for developing a state-funded culinary-tourism campaign. But he warns it would need plenty of support to flourish.

“It’s only going to be as strong as the human resources and fresh ingredients brought to the plate,” he said.

Rhode Island Hospitality Association President and CEO Dale Venturini concurred, saying the main challenge in building a robust local culinary industry is “maintaining, training and recruiting the necessary workforce.

“Our industry promotes from within probably more than any other business segment, but workers need to have the tools necessary to succeed,” she said. •

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