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HomeMy WebLinkAbout04-08-2015 Item LRC2_3.17Tourism Business Improvement District Management Subcommittee Meeting Minutes March 17, 2015 – 1:00 pm PRESENT: Wilkins; Pearce Constituent: Diana Zuniga (Lexington) STAFF PRESENT: Molly Cano, Tourism Manager; Lee Johnson ,ED Manager BUSINESS ITEMS 1. Helium Demo The committee received the demonstration of features of Helium for the SLO TBID from Zeppelin Inc representative Chad McNeill. Overall the features seemed to be in line with the direction the committee members would like to see Helium. Zeppelin was to provide follow up information to Studio Good for technical needs and send the complete documentation to Molly Cano for distribution and review by the committee. Once the documents are received the review period in line with the contract terms will begin. Specific items discussed included:  Helium PM is the central system that all info flows through and sends info to the SLO Vacations site  Amenities for property and room will need to defined by the TBID  Promotion codes & packages- each property can set their own and the region can set them as well (can set as a promotion codes as a percentage discount only)  Payment- use a pass through, payment is not made on the site, stripe is the service, the credit card info is never stored on the Helium server or the TBID server, payment is not made until check out  Rules, terms of use, privacy policy should be supplied by the TBID/City to Helium to be used on the site  Default sort for the properties- should be random but also give a sort option for alphabetical  Can sort the rooms by dates, property amenities, room amenities, price (lowest for each property) and states the lowest rate  TBID Board will be responsible to get the information from their properties for the necessary items for launch  Any changes to the integration will done by Studio Good on a staging server- then Zeppelin will push live when ready  Mobile optimization- Studio Good can provide a mobile optimized header and footer for the mobile  Stock image- we need to provide the default stock image when no image is displayed  Helium can tie into any PMS system that is available but they need some advocacy from the properties to make it happen  There may be a fee charged by the PMS systems to allow the property to ingrate the Helium API. The committee discussed the concern over the added potential one-time cost to the hotels to connect they system. Over 30% of the TBID properties use AutoClerk so Zeppelin will explore group pricing for integration. Zeppelin is committed to pay the subscription to each of the PMS systems to be able to accommodate the API feeds through Helium but the properties will need to cover their own integration costs.  The committee discussed the importance of the next stage to be able test the full reservation process.