The 2008 Rhode Island tourism season, which was officially kicked off in March, seemed at first like it was going to be a slow one, said Deena Liffman, who runs Providence Tours By Deena, giving historical tours either on foot or by stepping onto a tour bus.
Bus companies book their tours with Liffman months in advance and, if they don’t fill them, they cancel. “I had three tours scheduled during April and May that were cancelled, because they didn’t fill them up,” Liffman said last week. But reservations have picked up and, as of last week, about 15 bus tours have so far reserved her services through November.
Tours like Liffman’s are the backbone of a “historical authenticity” theme that’s being marketed this year in the Ocean State. R.I. Director of Tourism David C. DePetrillo told Providence Business News that a marketing campaign that’s set to kick off this month is targeting people that live within a 300- to 400-mile range, hoping to attract them to Rhode Island’s history, architecture and beaches.
“What we really want to show, as effectively as we can, is that what you’re going to find here – whether you’re interested in museums, in history or architecture – is that you’re going to get a real, authentic experience,” he said, adding that people want to see “the real thing, rather than a reproduction.”
Kevin Welch, general manager at The Village Inn at Narragansett Pier, a 62-room hotel and conference center that overlooks Narragansett Beach, said the weekends that historically have been the busiest, including University of Rhode Island’s graduation, are largely booked already.
About 80 percent of The Village Inn’s business is done between June and September, he said, and it’s a little too soon to tell how full the hotel will be for the rest of the season. But Welch said he expects New Englanders to favor southern Rhode Island this summer. “Destinations that are an hour or two hours from their homes might be benefiting, because people might feel that they can only drive one or two hours because of the price of gas,” he said.
DePetrillo said that with those prices rising – last week, $3.609 was the average price of a gallon of unleaded regular, according to AAA Southern New England – there’s a pool of about 50 million potential visitors within a half-day drive. “We have a good pool to draw from,” he said. “And if the price of gas goes up, people have to make decisions about how far they’re going to travel. We don’t like to see the price of gas go up, but people from places like New Jersey and Pennsylvania make look our way rather than having to drive a day or two out to the Midwest or West.”
But it’s not just day-trippers that are being courted, DePetrillo said. This year’s $300,000 marketing campaign includes $129,000 for online advertising that will reach a national audience.
Those ads, accentuating both the history and beauty of Rhode Island, will be positioned on Web sites that include travel-friendly National Geographic Traveler and usatoday.com/travel, along with a variety of food, news, history and sporting Web sites.
“We’re really focused on opportunities that have come up in online promotion,” he said. “Because we’re really targeting very specific people who we think would be interested in Rhode Island.”
The ads should reach about 8.5 million people between May 19 and August 9, according to DePetrillo’s office. That will be coupled with 400,000 e-mails sent from the R.I. Tourism Division to prospective visitors.
There’s also the Rhode Island 2008 Travel Guide that was released March 11.
Tourism councils put out similar guides, like South County Tourism Council’s South County Style magazine, which this year was beefed up to 100 pages, said President Myrna George.
“The magazine’s been refreshed and enhanced this year,” she said, “along with some individual town maps as well as some new editorial by Seth Brown that we’re very happy with.”
That catalog will go out to 40,000 households in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Canada this spring, she said, along with local distribution. There’s also a new Hampton Inn & Suites in South County Commons and traffic is up at Amtrak’s Kingston Station, she said.
“I think that that’s been a surprise to many people,” George said, “both to Amtrak as well as to the local areas. In years past it hasn’t enjoyed such a ridership.”
With the American dollar below the euro [in value] and running about even with the Canadian dollar, R.I. Tourism Division is also looking overseas.
The United Kingdom and Germany are scheduled so far to send more than 150 tour groups to New England this year. That’s the result of Discover New England, a nonprofit partnership formed 15 years ago between the New England states, DePetrillo said, adding that it’s led to the region being “well-positioned” for the dropping dollar.
“We’ve seen [those tour groups] grow from 15 years ago when there were only a handful of itineraries in Europe focusing on New England,” he said, so that in the past few years, foreign tours have become increasingly important to the Ocean State’s $5.5 billion tourism industry.
In Providence, July is set to be a big tourism month, said Martha Sheridan, president and CEO of the Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau.
Along with Providence’s Fourth of July fireworks display, the city will host the annual Sound Session outdoor concert weekend and the third-annual Providence Restaurant Weeks – expanded to a three-week event this year from July 6-20.
And, the state will host its first Ironman Triathlon, a 70.3-mile race being held July 13. At least 1,800 athletes are expected to traverse the state from Narragansett to Providence, “which is a great way to showcase our entire state to a whole group of interesting individuals,” Sheridan said.
Rhode Island now has scheduled about 32 conventions, ranging from 35 members to the 250-member National Association of Attorneys General and the 2,000-member Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry group, she said.
“I think all things being equal, I’m fairly optimistic about the upcoming season,” DePetrillo said. •
