October 2017 wildfires - one year later
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This week marks one year since the October 2017 wildfires. We’re reliving it through anniversary coverage in the media. We’re again having the “where were you when the fires started” conversations.
As a community, we’re reflecting on how far we’ve come in recovery and where we need to go now.
Personally, I’m incredibly proud of what the hospitality industry did for our community both during the fires and in the months after. People went above and beyond what anyone could expect, supporting firefighters and other first responders, and helping our neighbors in need.
At Sonoma County Tourism, we stepped up immediately to provide accurate information, and to let the world know Sonoma County was still open for business. We continue to bolster the hospitality industry with our marketing and sales efforts. Through our marketing to both domestic and international audiences, we’ve invited visitors to return – and they are. Our sales team continues to book meetings and group business for mid-week and the soft season.
And Sonoma County’s hospitality businesses are doing what they do best — providing guests with a world-class welcome and unforgettable experiences. Tourism supports the thousands of residents who work in our hospitality industry, where 91 percent of businesses are locally owned. When people visit Sonoma County, they support local families.
As an organization, we made a deliberate choice not to send out a press release about the anniversary of the fires. We didn’t want the fires to be the main focus of potential travelers. We do respond to journalists who ask for information and direct them to accurate sources.
The wildfires were a difficult time and it’s been a challenging year. I look forward to what’s next for Sonoma County and what we can achieve together. The resilient spirit shown throughout the region is living proof that “the love in the air is thicker than the smoke.”
I’m forever #SonomaProud,
- Tina
Tina Luster, communications manager
Sonoma County Tourism
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Not sure how you're feeling a year after the fires?
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The
California HOPE project offers free and confidential individual and group counseling services (in both English and Spanish) for all Sonoma County residents experiencing "anniversary reactions." Even if you didn't lose a home or a loved one in the October 2017 wildfires, you can still be affected by knowing others who suffered losses, or if you witnessed the fires, evacuated during the fires, or were under the threat of evacuation. Talk to a counselor over the phone or in person, with an appointment at a location and time convenient for you.
Espanol: 707-608-8814
Santa Rosa
Adults age 50+: 707-608-8804 / Santa Rosa: 707-608-8806
Petaluma & Sonoma Valley: 707-608-8806
North & West County: 707-608-8807
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Spreading the word about outdoor recreation
in Sonoma County
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Sonoma County Outdoor Recreation News is a new, quarterly newsletter providing timely news and updates about the local outdoor recreation economy. Learn about new business openings, expanded product offerings, trail openings, and more.
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California Economic Summit in Santa Rosa
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Don't miss the 2018 California Economic Summit,
Nov. 15 and 16
in Santa Rosa. This is the largest group of business, equity, environmental, and civic organizations working year round to improve upward mobility, build more housing, create a strong workforce, and strengthen the state's water sustainability.
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5 Fun Things to Do in Jenner, California
With kayaking, beach hopping, dining, and more, this video explores what's available in this coastal community.
You can watch more of SCT's
Sonoma County videos online, and
use them in promotions of your business or area.
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Visit CA video features Farmhouse Inn
As part of its Luxury Brand Pillar, Visit California is creating a series of one-minute videos. They've created one for the Farmhouse Inn, and it's already live on their consumer website and on YouTube.
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'Sonoma County: Life Opens Up' garners attention, praise
The article looks at "four destination campaigns from this year that each represent a trend that is defining tourism boards' marketing strategies and how travelers want to see the world."
SCT's new brand platform was named as one the four top trends because of the use of word associations as a key way to learn how travelers perceive a brand, at time when there are so many more sources for gathering travelers' perceptions, like Facebook and Twitter.
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Bay Area planners learn about Sonoma County arts
Suzy Montes, Sonoma County Tourism national sales manager, and Charmaine Louzao, SCT meeting sales and services manager, welcomed 14 Bay Area meeting planners and their guests to Sonoma County on Aug. 19 and 20, for a familiarization tour showcasing the arts in Sonoma County.
The group checked into the Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn and enjoyed a delicious dinner on the property, with wines from Paradise Ridge Winery. Then they were off to Jack London State Historic Park to experience a performance of Broadway Under the Stars. This was the first time any of these meeting planners had seen a Transcendence Theatre show, and they were blown away by how great it was. Many immediately made plans to return with friends and family.
The next day, five of the planners joined Montes for site visits to the Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn, Vintners Inn, Flamingo Resort, and the Hyatt Regency, with a stop for lunch at Sonoma Cutrer Winery, to highlight an off-site venue close to all these properties.
Thanks go to all the SCT partners participating in this event –
Ashley Barndt of Flamingo Resort, Ingrid Ticas of Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn, Jessica Adams of Vintners Inn, Ana Gutano of Hyatt Regency, and Sonia Byck-Barwick of Paradise Ridge Winery.
The meeting planners who attended represented Moss Adams, the Judicial Council of California, Global Personal Systems Marketing | HP Inc, Judicial Council of California, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Hewlett Packard Inc., Helms Briscoe, Profusa USA, Goodwin Procter LLP, Brittany Barr Consulting, and Agilent.
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Welcoming HelmsBriscoe associates
Recently, Sonoma County Tourism and its partners welcomed 27 associates from HelmsBriscoe, a global leader in meetings procurement and site selection, for a familiarization tour as part of the group's fourth quarter meeting.
They stayed at the Vintners Inn, where they held their all-day meeting. The group enjoyed lunch and wine blending at Meadowcroft Wines; visited the Hyatt Regency Sonoma Wine Country, Doubletree by Hilton Hotel Sonoma Wine Country, and Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn; and dined at Hopmonk Tavern in Sebastopol.
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Bringing Sonoma County to meeting planners in Dallas
Suzy Montes and Jennifer Richards, both with SCT's sales team, met with 38 meeting planners on Sept. 20 at Plan Your Meetings,
a cutting-edge "reverse trade show" developed specifically for non-traditional meeting professionals.
Montes and Richards were onsite to educate meeting planners about the possibilities available in Sonoma County. While in Texas, Montes and Richards also stopped in nearby Arlington, calling at Galactic Performance Solutions, a full-service incentives and performance improvement company, and stopping by the Arlington Convention and Visitors Bureau.
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Sonoma County and the Media
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Sonoma County in the news ...
Here's a sampling of the results of Sonoma County Tourism's work with the media — just a few of the many recent articles and blogs promoting Sonoma County.
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By Shivani Vora
The New York Times (Circ: 597,955; UMV 29,886,442)
After a visit hosted by SCT and its local partners, this feature article was two years in the making, and appeared online first, and then in print. It highlights Armstrong Redwoods, Getaway Adventures, Sonoma Coast State Park, Farmhouse Inn, DaVero Farms & Winery, Trattore Farms, Lynmar Estate, and Jordan Winery.
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By Jonathan Cristaldi
Food & Wine (UMV: 9,396,329)
This list includes four Sonoma County wines — the 2014 David Ramey Pinot Noir Russian River Valley, 2015 Gary Farrell Pinot Noir Russian River Valley, 2016 Fort Ross Vineyard Sea Slopes Pinot Noir Sonoma Coast, and the 2015 Walter Hansel Pinot Noir North Slope, Russian River Valley.
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By Emily Kaufman
KATU Channel 2 News, Portland, Oregon (Viewership: 30,350; UMV: 1,528,906)
Claudia Vecchio, SCT president and CEO, helped Kaufman with this broadcast segment that includes Armstrong Redwoods, horseback riding, kayaking, Charles M Schulz – Sonoma County Airport, wine tasting, walking tours, hot air ballooning, and what she termed “the spectacular coastline.” The segment was also broadcast on
KNTV Channel 13, Las Vegas, Nevada (UMV: 445,006).
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YourTango.com (UMV: 3,463,114)
As a result of dedicated SCT pitching efforts, item number 19 is “Sonoma County, California.” Saying that Sonoma County “represents the best of Northern California,” the article includes the free Sonoma County Vineyard Adventure walks, Sonoma Canopy Tours, redwoods, Bravas, Bird & The Bottle, Monti’s, Stark’s Steak & Seafood, Willi’s Seafood & Raw Bar, AutoCamp Russian River, and The Astro Motel.
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OurAge (UMV: 800,000)
This is just one of five articles about Sonoma County that this Japanese web magazine published as a result of a press trip that SCT and local partners hosted in early spring.
The articles featured Russian River Vineyards, Healdsburg SHED, Wild Flour Bread, Osmosis Day Spa & Sanctuary, and SingleThread.
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By Lindsay Cohn
Brides (UMV: 1,526,238)
Pitching and ongoing media relations resulted in this article featuring The Astro Motel, Vintners Inn, John Ash & Co., The Spinster Sisters, Santa Rosa Vintners Square, Belden Barns, Matanzas Creek Winery, Russian River Brewing Company, Montgomery Village, Charles M. Schulz Museum, and Osmosis Day Spa Sanctuary.
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Travel destinations play critical role in crisis management, recovery
Two side-by-side images exemplify the vital role that destination marketing organizations play in crisis management — two different messages, photographed in the same place one year apart. “S.O.S.” — a desperate plea for food and water — was the message scrawled into the middle of an intersection in Punta Santiago, Puerto Rico, in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in September 2017. But the message today? “Bienvenidos” and “#CoverTheProgress.”
Revised stats show international visitors to U.S. up slightly in 2017
The Department of Commerce revised its 2017 inbound tourist numbers, adding 3.6 million international visitors to the total and reversing what had been reported as a 3.1 percent downturn in arrivals to an increase of 0.7 percent. Revised figures show almost 77 million international visitors arrived in the U.S. last year. Total arrivals were also revised for 2015 and 2016, adding 3,218 and 540,090, respectively.
US Travel shifts focus to domestic tourism
The U.S. Travel Association is making structural changes as it doubles down on domestic leisure travel growth after listening to membership feedback and working to reverse a three-year decline in international travel to the United States.
Americans are leaving vacation time on the table
According to research from Project: Time Off, Americans left 705 million vacation days unused last year. That means there is a one in four chance that the average person did not take a vacation in 2017. In fact, 24 percent of Americans report not taking a vacation in a year or more.
Peddler of fake reviews on TripAdvisor gets jail time in Italy
An Italian court handed down a nine-month prison sentence to a person who wrote fake hotel reviews on
TripAdvisor
in exchange for money from hotels aiming to boost their profile on the giant reviews platform. PromoSalento successfully posted fake reviews on behalf of several hundred businesses. While posting fake reviews is not new, the punishment, in this case, is extraordinary.
Tours & experiences are next great untapped online travel market
The tours and activities space is undergoing a radical reinvention of what exactly it means to experience something on vacation. The vast majority of tours, however, are still sold offline either in-destination or through traditional tour operator brands and travel agents; around 80 percent of the sector’s gross bookings take place offline, according to technology provider Trekksoft.
More than half of Americans use shared services like Uber, Airbnb
The sharing economy continues to provide ways for Americans to save and earn money, but most are using shared services as customers, not to earn income. The latest Country Financial Security Index® revealed that over half of Americans (54 percent) are using some type of streaming, ride-hailing, home sharing or maintenance service often. Of Americans using these services, more than half (59 percent) are using them at least once a week and one quarter (25 percent) are using them every single day.
Growing pains for influencer marketing
Social media influencers are increasingly hot commodities in the travel industry for their voices and large audiences. But as influencer marketing grows up, it’s also going through some growing pains. Many travel brands want to work with influencers but aren’t sure how to measure return on investment or justify spending thousands — or even millions — of dollars on untested partnerships that may fail.
Hotel amenities: What do guests really use?
Hotels provide a lengthy menu of amenities based on the (largely accurate) perception that guests want those amenities and claim they will use them. While many guests do exactly that, a new study from the Cornell University School of Hotel Administration finds that a substantial percentage will “overpredict” which amenities they will use.
Restaurant industry losing its young workforce
If restaurant staffing problems were a headache before, just wait until you see what the field looks like a decade from now. According to the National Restaurant Association, there are about 800,000 open jobs in the industry (an all-time high), and the industry is expected to add 1.6 million more jobs within the next ten years. In that same period, the pool of 16- to 24-year-old employees, a demographic that makes up 40 percent of the industry’s workforce, is expected to drop by 1.3 million people.
300-mile hiking trail could transform California’s north coast
State Senator Mike McGuire’s proposal to create a 300-mile-long hiking trail from San Francisco Bay to Humboldt Bay passed the State Assembly on 30 August, on a vote of 62 to three. The proposed bill still needs to be approved by the governor’s office but, if successful, it will transform part of the crumbling Northwestern Pacific Railway into the Great Redwood Trail.
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