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HomeMy WebLinkAbout06/17/1997, C-5 - USE OF PROMOTIONAL COORDINATING COMMITTEE (PCC) ENHANCED PROMOTIONAL FUNDS council °6°,, _qq j ac,Enaa izEpoRt �H� cs C I T Y O F SAN LUIS o B I S P 0 FROM: Ken Hampian,Assistant City Administrative Officer Prepared By: Wendy George,Assistant to the City Administrative Officer uy� SUBJECT: Use of Promotional Coordinating Committee (PCC) Enhanced Promotional Funds CAO RECOMMENDATION Approve the PCC's recommendation to allocate Enhanced Promotional Funds as follows: 1. $4,000 to print 3,000 brochures for the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles(WASBE)conference. 2. $1,200 to purchase slide sets for media promotion. 3. $1,500 to create a new tourism web site,separate from the Chamber of Commerce's regular web site. 4. $2,000 to purchase software which will allow linkage between the Chamber of Commerce's Calendar of Tourism Events database and the new tourism web site. DISCUSSION Background Several years ago, in conjunction with an increase in the Transient Occupancy Tax (TOT)from 9% to 101/6, the City created an Enhanced Promotional Fund to be used to finance innovative promotional ideas and provide seed money for new special events. Annually, the PCC makes recommendations to the City Council on how this fund should be spent. At its last meeting, the PCC was presented with four new promotional ideas, one by the Visitors and Conference Bureau (VCB) to support a major conference and three from the Chamber of Commerce to upgrade the promotional information it provides. The PCC is recommending that all four of these proposals be funded. WASBE Conference Brochures In the summer of 1999, the City of San Luis Obispo will be the site for WASBE '99, an international conference of symphonic bands and ensembles. The conference is projected to bring up to 3,000 people to the City for a week full of concerts and meetings at the Performing Arts Center. The concerts will be open to the public. A WASBE committee has been formed with the VCB taking the lead. Other members include the lodging community, the Chamber of Commerce, the Symphony, and Cal Poly. The WASBE Committee is charged with raising an estimated $125,000 to $150,000 needed to provide the many services and products for this conference. To do d-5-1 Council Agenda Report-Use of Enhanced Promotional Funds Page 2 so,the Committee will be staging a series of fiord raisers and applying for grant money. The Committee's first obligation is to produce a preliminary conference brochure advertising the 1999 conference. It will contain information about San Luis Obispo and its facilities to encourage participation at the conference. This brochure's primary distribution will be at the WASBE '97 Conference this summer, where the VCB will be exhibiting. The 3,000 brochures will focus on San Luis Obispo, the Performing Arts Center and the lodging opportunities. Next year, the Committee will need to produce another, more complete brochure that is specific to the 1999 conference program. The PCC believes that WASBE '99 will be a unique opportunity for the City to present itself as a site for much larger conferences than in the past, than to the addition of the Performing Arts Center. While the PCC regrets that this particular conference will be held during the summer tourist season, it believes it is extremely important that the City support WASBE `99 in every way possible because it provides a great opportunity to develop San Luis Obispo's reputation as a site for future conferences of this size. Because the WASBE Committee is just beginning its fundraising efforts, it needs subsidizing for the initial conference brochure. At its May 14'meeting the PCC voted to recommend granting the VCB $4,000 in Enhanced Promotional Funds for this purpose. Purchase of Slide Sets by the Chamber of Commerce The use of pre-written, specialty stories by the print media is a growing trend. The Chamber of Commerce has had some success in having feature stories about the City run when the stories are provided free of charge, complete with photographs. Additionally,the Chamber is often requested to provide pictures for articles written by magazines themselves. The preferred mode of providing photographs in today's market is in the format of slides. As part of its proposed promotional contract for 1997-99,the Chamber requested one-time finding to produce a bank of duplicate slides sets which could be submitted,along with stories,to key media. The PCC felt that since the requested funding was for a one-time duplication of slides sets,it should more appropriately come from Enhanced Promotional Funds, rather than be included in the annual contract. At its May 10 meeting the PCC voted to recommend spending $1,200 for duplication costs for the slides. There would be no additional charge from the Chamber for any staff time, postage or supplies required by this extension of the Chamber's promotional program. Creation of a New Tourism Web Site While the Chamber of Commerce currently has an Internet web site which includes basic visitor information on its home page, there is much that could be done to enhance both the kind and amount of information presented and the "friendliness" of access. As part of its 1997-99 contract, the Chamber proposed a separate tourism web site, linked to its basic site, which would be professionally created. t�3� Council Agenda Report-Use of Enhanced Promotional Funds Page 3 The PCC is very excited about this concept More and more visitors are planning their trips and vacations by use of the Internet and the PCC believes that it is critical that the City, via the Chamber, be in a position to take advantage of this new market. However, as with the slide sets, the PCC felt that this one-time expense was best funded through Enhanced Promotional Funds, rather than as an increase to the Chamber's on-going contract. At its May 10 meeting the PCC voted to recommend spending$1,500 to create a new, improved tourism web site. Linkaee of the San Luis Obispo Calendar of Tourism Events to the Chamber of Commerce Tourism Web Site Until recently, the City had no all-inclusive calendar of events. As a result, major events often selected conflicting dates and tourists had no way of finding out what activities were going on at any given time, either before or during their visits. Several organizations have tried to establish central calendars, the latest of which was SLONET. SLONET's calendar has not been successful for several reasons, the main ones being that event organizers were required to enter their own listings and it was not available to event organizers who did not have access to the Internet. In 1996, with the encouragement of the Tourism Council, the Chamber of Commerce began working with its own software to develop a searchable, printable, reliable database calendar of tourism related events. The Chamber has devoted considerable energy to educating the community about the new Calendar of Tourism Events. Letters were mailed to non-profit organizations and clubs in the San Luis Obispo area seeking event information. The letters were followed up, as necessary,by phone calls from a Cal Poly intern. This calendar currently contains more than 2,100 events and is updated by 5-10 events each day. The Chamber now provides information to visitors orally from this data base. The calendar can also be printed and mailed or faxed. However, due to its size, printing has become costly, even with specific date range selection. The calendar has not been added to the Chamber's web site due to its length and the fact that viewers would simply receive a listing of ALL events if the database were down loaded to their computers. The Chamber of Commerce has presented a new software program which would allow its database to interface with its tourism web site. The program provides for a completely searchable calendar of events which can be updated daily. The software to create this link costs $3,000 and requires a $500 per year fee for file server service (in lieu of the Chamber being required to purchase and maintain its own costly computer server system). The Chamber proposed that the cost of the software and server fee be shared with the City. The City would pay $2,000 of the software expense and the server fee would be divided equally. The Chamber would pay to upgrade its existing hardware and software,as needed,and would maintain and regularly update the calendar. The PCC was enthusiastic about the value such calendar access would have both to local citizens planning community events and to tourists planning a visit to the City. As a result, at its May 14'b meeting the PCC voted to recommend spending $2,000 of Enhanced Promotional Funds as the City's contribution to purchase the required software, and to roll the City's share of the server fee into the annual Chamber of Commerce contract. 65-3 Council Agenda Report-Use of Enhanced Promotional Funds Page 4 FISCAL UYVACT The PCC proposes spending a total of$8,700 as follows: WASBE '99 brochure $4,000 Media Slide Set $1,200 New Tourism Web Site $1,500 Link between Tourism Calendar and Web Site $2,000 Total $8,700 There is currently $30,800 remaining in the Enhanced Promotional Fund. Following this allocation, the balance will be committed to the entry signs project and another recommendation that will be before the Council in July. Attachments 1 -Proposal from the VCB for WASBE '99 brochure 2 -Proposed contract options from the Chamber of Commerce 3 -Proposal for calendartweb site linkage from Chamber of Commerce 4-PCC minutes for May 14, 1997 C•S� C San Luis Obispo County April 9, 1997 Visitors 6 Conference Bureau (P . CD Ms.Natalie Diggins San Luis Obispo PCC 990 Palm Street San Luis Obispo, CA 93401 Dear Natalie: The.City of San Luis Obispo will be the site for WASBE `99, an international conference which will bring up to 3,000 people to the city and surrounding areas for a week full of concerts in our state of the art Performing Arts Center. The WASBE Coordinating Committee,made up of representatives from the VCB (lead agency), the San Luis Obispo lodging community,the Chamber of Commerce,the Symphony, Cal Poly, and others, is required to provide many services and products for this conference. To raise the estimated$125,000 to $150,000 needed,the WASBE Committee will be staging a series of fundraisers as well as apply for available grant monies over the next two years. Our first obligation is to produce a brochure about San Luis Obispo and the facilities to encourage participation here in 1999. This brochure's primary distribution will be at the WASBE `97 Conference where we will be exhibiting. The 3,000 brochures will focus on San Luis Obispo,the Performing Arts Center, and the lodging opportunities with a range of rates by room type. Next year,the Committee will have to produce another,more complete brochure of 10,000 that is specific to the WASBE program. For this initial brochure,the WASBE Committee is requesting up to $4,000 from the enhanced marketing fund. The PCC will have content review, keeping in mind the WASBE requirements and meeting the tight timeline of June 1 for finished product This is a terrific opportunity for the promotion of San Luis Obispo worldwide. We look forward to your swift response. cerely, Jo S. Biaggini Ex utive Director cc: W ndy George 1037 M71 Street,5an Luis Obispo,Califomia 93401 (805)547-8000 FAX-C805)513-9i98 Web:SanLuisObispoCounty-com Atkchmeit+ 1 6-5-60' PROPOSED PROMOTIONAL PROGRAM CONTRACT For more than six years, the City has either maintained the promotional program contract at either a flat rate with infrequent increases to reflect cost of living. Maintaining status quo in funding while costs continue to increase does little to help the City's promotional program grow. As a result, the Chamber proposes a basic service contract with three options for additional service: Basic service—$35,109 per year This basic contract for 1996-97, 97-98 reflects a 3 percent per year increase. This plan will allow the program to continue sending basic releases and providing basic service. This includes use of a professional staff, comprehensive computer system, a data base of media contacts developed over 20 years and a reputation for handling their requests in a professional and timely manner. It also includes the basic maintenance of a visitor information site on the World Wide Web,maintenance of the Community Calendar of Events on the World Wide Web, and $250 per year to help defray the cost of the Internet server connection necessary to operate the calendar link. Option 1—Slide Sets— $1,200 in year one The use of pre-written, specialty stories by print media is a growing trend. Many large members of the media will run feature stories complete with photographs if the material is provided them free of charge. An additional $1,200 in year one,would allow the City to expand its promotions program to include such stories, complete with slides,written for and submitted to key media. The additional cost merely covers slide duplication costs. There is no additional charge for additional staff time,postage, supplies and other goods and services this extended program would require. Option 2—Familiarization Tours—$3,000 per year This alternative, the City could further expand its promotion program to include familiarization tours. Familiarization tours for qualified,working members of the media are among the most cost-effective methods of gaining non-commercial coverage of San Luis Obispo. Option 3—World Wide Web —$1,500 in year one Although the Chamber currently maintains basic visitor information on its homepage, service of those pages and further development of those pages could be augmented. WWW service would include a considerable upgrade of information currently San Luis Obispo Chamber of Commerce Contract Review and Proposal Page 23 Afjach men f 2- 6-$"6 available online and additional online promotional efforts. Option 4—Weblink Software—$2,000 in year one The Chamber currently maintains a community calendar of events of particular interest or impact on tourists. A$4,000 software has recently become available which would allow the Chamber'to download that information to the World Wide Web several times each week. The Chamber proposes that the City pay half of the cost of the software. The Chamber will cover the rest of the software cost, any hardware upgrade costs, and will update the calendar daily and download the new calendar to the World Wide Web several times weekly. San Luis Obispo Chamber of Commerce Contract Review and Proposal Page 24 San Luis Obispo Chamber of Commerce Proposal for Worldwide Access to San Luis Obispo Calendar of Tourism Events History: Until recently,San Luis Obispo had no all-inclusive calendar of events.Various companies and agencies tried to keep track of their own events and had sketchy information about just a few other events in and around San Luis Obispo. In many cases, larger institutions were unaware of events happening within their own organizations. Although the Chamber maintained a public events calendar which was free to the public,the information was not available in printed form and included a limited amount of information. Because there was no central calendar of events,major events often selected dates that conflicted directly with each other. Since no major event calendar was available,picking non-conflicting dates for major events was quite a challenge. Double booking a weekend with major tourism events,such conflicts did little for San Luis Obispo's image with tourists who were unable to find rooms on overcrowded weekends while leaving other weekends wide open. Several organizations have tried to establish central calendars, the latest of which was SLONET. In 1995, the Chamber's Tourism Council established developing a central calendar of tourist-related events as one of its top goals.The Chamber worked with SLONET which had established a similar goal for itself and provided training sessions for the public once SLONET's calendar program was up and running. In the end, the SLONET calendar did not work for a number of reasons:it was not simple,it was not user friendly,and,since organizers were required to enter their own listings,it was not available to event organizers who did not have access to the Internet. Upgraded Chamber Calendar of Tourism Events: In mid-1996,the Chamber began working with its own software to develop a searchable,printable, reliable database calendar of tourism related events. Our criteria: ,k4ac hrnen+ 3 C$-� events included in the calendar must open to the general public,must be of interest to visitors and potential visitors.The calendar also includes major events which could impact visitors,such as conferences or seminars placing significant impact on local lodging. In early Autumn,the Chamber began educating the community about the new Calendar of Tourism Events. Letters were mailed to all known non-profit organizations and clubs in the San Luis Obispo area.Many responded to the letter.Those that did not were phoned by a Cal Poly intern who helped educate them about the calendar. For the past eight months,the Chamber has continued to refine this calendar of events which includes more than 2,100 events (as of May 2, 1997). Although the bulk of the information was provided at the beginning of the year, the Chamber continues to receive information about 5-10 additional events every day.The Chamber updates the calendar daily. The problem—Getting the word out: Currently,the Chamber continues to provide information to visitors orally as it has always done. The calendar can also be printed and mailed or faxed,but due to its size,printing has become costly,even if date ranges are set. The Chamber maintains a page on the World Wide Web but the calendar has not been added due to its considerable length. If included on the page at this point,the viewer would simply receive a listing of ALL of the events which would take considerable time to download. The solution: A new software program is available that would allow the Chamber's database to interface with the World Wide Web. The program provides for a completely searchable calendar of events and allows for daily updates! It would also allow the: Chamber to more easily and more quickly update the Visitors Information pages and other information about the community and local attractions. Websurfers would be able to search the entire calendar of events by category,by date, and more.Travelers planning a trip to San Luis Obispo in November,for instance, could search for events planned during the dates of their visit. If they're only interested in a specific type of event such as music,they could search for just music events happening during their visit. The proposal: The San Luis Obispo Chamber of Commerce would like to expand public access to the San Luis Obispo Calendar of Tourism Events by purchasing,installing and maintaining the new software and continuing to maintain the calendar and web page. However, the software costs$3,000 and requires a$500 per year fee for server service (an integral part of this program which would allow the Chamber to provide this service without purchasing and maintaining costly computer server systems). It may also require upgrade of some of the Chamber's existing software and hardware. The Chamber proposes that the City fund$2,000 for the purchase of the software and $250 per year for the server service. The Chamber agrees to pay the additional cost of purchasing the software,upgrading its existing software and hardware as needed to meet the new program's needs, and the additional server subscription costs. The Chamber also agrees to maintain and regularly update the calendar on the World Wide Web. grants-in-aid criteria when evaluating requests for events from Enhanced Promotional Funds. The Committee members agreed. There was much discussion by the Committee about the event, and concern was expressed that again there were no representatives present to answer questions. The Committee felt that by using the current GIA criteria, it would not be appropriate to fund the salaries of the event coordinators. They also felt that the amount requested as an honorarium for a guest performer was too high. Pati Brown questioned whether funding less than the full amount would kill the event, but without any one from Literacy Council present,that question could not be answered. A motion was made by Bill Pyper, seconded by Sandy Baer, that the Literacy Council be granted $7,000 for advertising. The motion was defeated,with Natalie Diggins,Anne Cruikshanks, Charlotte Alexander and Pati Brown dissenting. A second motion was made by Bill Pyper, seconded by Sandy Baer, that the Literacy Council be granted $7,000 for advertising contingent upon its presenting the PCC with a plan which addressed accountability issues such as marketing, promotion and fundraising. The motion passed with Anne Cruikshanks dissenting. 10. VCB REQUEST FOR FUNDING FOR WASBE BROCHURE Before presenting her request, Jonni Biaggini reported that the VCB had just finished a sales blitz in San Jose, where it was promoting San Luis Obispo county as an affordable site for meetings. She also reported that San Luis Obispo would be the site of a meeting of a San Francisco and an LA motorcycle group to support the AIDS Healthcare Foundation. Jonni then presented the VCB's request for $4,000 to print 5,000 brochures for the WASBE conference. Any costs of the conference must be paid for by the WASBE Committee, including all printed materials. While the Committee can raise money by selling tickets to the events and merchandise, there is a need for funding the advanced brochure now so that it will be available for distribution at the current WASBE conference and at a music festival in Chicago to be held in the near future. Barnett Cox & Associates has donated some of its time to help with the brochure design. On a motion by Sandy Baer, seconded by Pati Brown, the PCC approved the request for$4,000 for the production of the promotional brochure for the WASBE conference in San Luis Obispo. Bill Pyper abstained. 11. REQUEST FOR FUNDING FROM CHAMBER OF COMMERCE FOR COMPUTER SOFTWARE AND ANNUAL SERVER FEE Dave Garth explained that the Chamber is planning to create a separate web site which will be specifically designated for tourism. It will be developed by a Chamber member who does such work professionally. The funding request is for software that would allow a linkage between this web site and the Chamber's calendar of events which is now held in a computer data base updated regularly by Cal Poly intems. On a motion by Sandy Baer, seconded by Bill Pyper, the PCC unanimously agreed to recommend using$2,250 of Enhanced Promotional funds for the Chamber's software and annual server fee request. An outgrowth of the Chamber's request was a PCC concern that this calendar might duplicate SLONETs request for funding for upgrading the community calendar as part of its Virtual Village. Further concern arose when one member brought up the fact that SLONET was about to merge with a similar operation out of Santa Barbara. Since no one from SLONET was available to answer the PCC's concerns at this meeting the Committee felt that it would be prudent to recommend no grant funding to SLONET pending their opportunity to explain the impact of the merger at the GIA public hearing on May 28°i. As a result, on a motion by Pati Brown, seconded by Bill Pyper, the PCC unanimously voted to recommend that the SLONET grant request not be funded . �{-�cCHmer►f 4 3 12. COSIDERATION OF USING EHANCED PROMOTIONAL FUNDS TO PAY FOR SLIDE SETS AND WEB SITE ENHANCEMENT REQUESTED BY THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE AS PART OF ITS 1997-99 CONTRACT. Because these expenditures are one-time in nature, and the items could be purchased as soon as Council approval is received, rather than waiting for the completion of the budget process, staff recommended that the PCC consider funding them with Enhanced Promotional Funds rather than including them in the Chamber's 1997-99 contract as recommended earlier. On a motion by Bill Pyper, seconded by Charlotte Alexander, the PCC unanimously approved recommending that $2,700 of Enhanced Promotional Funds be used to produce slide sets for the media and to improve the Chamber's web site. 13. ADJOURNMENT The meeting was adjourned at 8:10 p.m 4