20 recommendations, six strategic focus areas and a ten year vision for Fort Wayne and Allen County to become a premier destination for visitors from all walks of life.

Good evening.

I'm Bruce Haines.

All that adds up to a tourism master plan and it comes with Visit Fort Wayne's promise to be the driving force in creating a diverse and inclusive destination experience.

We're going to learn more about the Tourism master Plans road map for making these dreams a reality.

On this week's PrimeTime and with us today, our guests from Visit Fort Wayne, where Jill Boggs is president and CEO.

And Jessa Campbell is the director of destination Development and communications.

And we welcome you both.

Thanks for being here.

Thank you, Bruce.

Thanks for having us.

We really appreciate it.

Yeah.

Well, you know, when you describe the work you do, just for starters, and they say people say, oh, you're in tourism.

What's that mean?

Right.

And most people think of flying right over Indiana when they think of tourism.

But we translate all our tourism assets and experience cities into the benefits economically and socially of the visitor economy.

And what that brings to our destination, which we referred to as Fort Wayne.

It is a destination for a lot of different types of people.

I think about is it art, science or C both of the above?

Definitely C, both of them above.

Trying to match kind of what our community has to offer and selling that to the science of figuring out who is interested in that.

Those families in the region who are looking for those weekend getaways or tournaments or wanting to come to a tournament here in Fort Wayne or coming for a convention.

Now, folks who have been sharing their experiences about what they've seen, the destinations where they've been telling those stories over time.

We came to know you as the Convention and Visitors Bureau, you are Visit Fort Wayne.

But that's also a C, youre both of the above.

That is true.

And there are thousands of convention and visitor bureaus across the country.

In 1949, the Chamber of Commerce, at that time formed the first Convention and Visitors Bureau in Allen County.

And it was my predecessor, Dan O'Connell, was at the very beginning of that.

They convention visitor bureaus all over the place.

Sometimes if they have a larger city like redo in Allen County, Fort Wayne, they often name themselves after the city.

So our incorporated name is the Convention Visitors Bureau, Fort Wayne slash Allen County.

But we go by Visit Fort Wayne.

And you hope that people won't go by, Visit Fort Wayne, that they will come in to Visit Fort Wayne.

Exactly.

We hope to see their pretty faces here in our city and out in the community as well.

And those wonderful neighborhoods.

You are a resource in and of yourself.

If folks are expecting out-of-town guests, I guess me and you can make available these resources that are out already.

Yeah.

So our offices are located at 97 South Harrison Street and at that location we have a wonderful visitor center.

Katie and Nancy are at the front desk waiting for you to come and ask questions, maybe get a little souvenir for your family that's not located here, you know, moved away or helped plan kind of a getaway for them, finding things to do, restaurants, places to stay if they need to do that as well as, you know, those fun activities to do.

Going to see the public art.

Where do you find those?

Where do you kind of seek that out, that information?

We have all of that here at the Fort Wayne Visitor Center.

Come down and we'd love to see everybody in there and asking us all those hard questions or what we like to do.

Stump the band.

Yeah, let's see where things go.

I'm thinking now of these last few years, this is the road to recovery from COVID for tourism.

What have these past 3 to 4 years been like for you?

Well, I think we've all been pleasantly surprised on the rebound.

Fort Wayne has rich facilities, amenities.

A lot of groups are back traveling again.

And we've seen some good numbers since pre-pandemic.

We have exceeded those from 2019.

So we're super excited about that.

And that has manifested in several ways of benefit for our destination.

I saw something and the numbers continue.

The spirit of the numbers are the most important thing, but the letter of a few of them, Allen County seeing a 26% increase in tourism in 2022, north of, well, nearly 9 million people and more than a billion just under $1,000,000,000 in spending.

These are some of the ripple effects of tourism that I'm not sure folks know.

Get connected in this.

Write that 8.8 million individuals consist of leisure travel travelers that enjoy our various amenities for leisure travel.

They are sports attendees at facilities, meetings and conventions, business talent, attraction, visitors that are looking to possibly work here and move here.

Many of them use our resources or the quality of place experts in that.

But what those numbers really mean for our destination and for our residents is they generate a lot of tax dollars.

So locally it's nearly $50 million and those funds help with infrastructure improvements, public safety, public improvement projects.

So that's why the value of the visitor dollar in spending is really beneficial for our destination and our residents as a result.

I'd also add that those of visitors coming into our community are supporting those amenities that you and I love to enjoy - the residents love to enjoy.

They're supporting and offsetting, you know, that funding, you know, Fort Wayne Children's Zoo.

We have these wonderful attractions in our community and supporting those not only by residents, but visitors help to do that as well and help kind of make those sustainable and live longer.

And not only the spending and the ripple effect of that, but also in terms of employment.

Yes, we have seen an increase in that.

In 2021, the tourism industry in Fort Wayne - Allen County supported 11,200 jobs and we have seen an increase of 22% for that for 2022 of 13,600 jobs just in the tourism hospitality industry locally.

So think about this being like the eighth largest industry or something along that line.

And in the county, which is up there, I think that was an aha moment.

It was an aha moment for us.

Also Indiana County ranking for Allen County and tourism spending are number three out of 92 counties in Indiana.

So we our residents are proud of what we have here.

We're all proud to share it.

We are an economic development organization as it pertains to tourism wealth that is brought into our community.

But the exposure through our marketing, extensive destination marketing, that we do helps our partners in economic development, city development, business investment development to expose Fort Wayne and our quality of life to a lot of people.

We market in over 30 cities and very strategically our marketing team.

This is a specialized marketing for travel, so we have a team of experts that use every marketing tool possible and strategy to get people here and to at least be exposed.

They get the kind of improvements that Northeast Indiana has enjoyed, and I think we can include all 11 counties in the conversation.

But certainly, you know, the generating out of Allen over the last decade, this is a powerful force that I'm wondering if in fact the tourism master plan was attempting to harness.

You know, we have fire.

We have now invented fire.

Collectively, we and now how do we continue to use that to have that tourism flame burn as brightly as possible?

What was the background to this point?

Well, Bruce, you are exactly right.

Tourism master plans are developed in destinations, normally larger cities, that are in periods of immense, immense growth.

So this plan started out as members of the city of Fort Wayne, ourselves and Greater Fort Wayne Inc talking about how do we ensure sustainability, growth, ideally, but responsible growth in our visitor spending for the next ten years.

We all recognize the economic impact that they bring when visitors come here.

So remember, I was here one year and it's the first plan for Allen County, but the overwhelming support for it financially and also those being involved in the process really could not do it.

It's perfect timing for Fort Wayne to have a plan like this, and the plans serve to validate other plans that are out there.

That's what was really nice and in the process is truly a residents plan.

Over 2200 residents completed surveys for the tourism master plan.

I think our consultants maybe were hoping for 1000.

We had over 600 pass visitors complete the survey.

We had hundreds of stakeholders.

2200 residents came up with 49 initiatives, steering committee got it down to 20.

The consultant recommended ten.

With the steering committee's like, “There's no way.

” 20 it is.

A lot of them are already in process within our community.

So we have 20 initiatives and eight of them are assigned to Visit Fort Wayne to lead.

The others are under the umbrella of another organization where they are leading it and have agreed to step up and do that.

And then taking care of things like communication and destination development.

What has this planning to plan and then the plan itself process, what has that been like?

So it's been a year long effort.

So we started way back in January 2023 with our consultants coming into the community, seeing our assets, doing a site tour, having those conversations with our stakeholders.

As Jill mentioned, we have about eight 800 100 stakeholder conversations ranging from our partners with venues in hotels to restaurants and small business owners to, you know, community development organizations.

So it's been based a lot in kind of that community conversation in those researching of the communities as well of what is our residents want to see, What do visitors find when they come here?

What are they looking for?

What do meeting planners when they're looking to host event or hosting of and in Fort Wayne, What are they needing or missing that we don't have?

And that can help set us off for the future and better for the future.

So it took a year long work of putting out this plan, putting out ideas, kind of seeing where it fits, what are people's interest in it, having those conversations.

And we're here now and trying to get the word out that we have this, that this is kind of our goals.

Looking at the ten year vision, I mean, the work starts now of, you know, the exciting work, at least for me, of getting to do that.

And by the way, you can see before you those six areas that Jill and Jessa mentioned were represented graphically and you can play along at home, if you will, when by visiting the Visit Fort Wayne website and find this whole thing, the exact summary timelines, all of that information available and for why it is so important when you realize how accessible and that's part of the the driver there to Fort Wayne is from so many areas.

It is a destination in and of itself.

And there it is for your mouse and computer to find online.

Let's walk through those six areas and in no particular order, why don't we start with the foundational.

Yeah, I'll jump right into that.

So kind of is a unique area of that focus.

So foundational is a look at the broad overarching goal with the plan is to be accessible.

It came out loud and clear in our conversations and the surveys we collected that our community one celebrates our accessibility in terms of being a destination for all abilities, and we want to celebrate that, but also uplift that.

And how can we be better knowing no destination or city or place is going to be perfect, no entity.

But we have room to grow and what can we grow and where can we grow in that area?

So not only is accessibility, its own recommendation and own project that we're going to be looking into setting a task force together and putting together an assessment of our community, but it also permeates all the other recommendations and wanting to be weaved throughout those efforts as well.

Well, I do want to add, Bruce, if I can, that there are 15 million travelers in the US alone who have accessibility needs that are not being met right now when they go on vacation.

15 million and that's only going to grow with the aging population.

And we're hearing from everyone, all of us will probably be disabled at some point as we age.

So it is something that we were really excited our consultants and everyone picked up on is the foundation of future development as we go forward.

Make sense?

Yes, and certainly across our region.

But in navigating downtown and in enjoying downtown, downtown Fort Wayne being another focus area.

Absolutely.

So downtown Fort Wayne, looking at that kind of branding of it, what's the story we're telling with the nation and the region and what's bringing people into the community?

How can we continue to make that happen and also tell that story, but as well as looking at winter activation, so looking at things to do in the winter time when oftentimes in this region we go indoors, we stay home, maybe watch some TV, but what's some things that we can do to engage people that are visiting, engage our residents for the long term?

And maybe it's an attraction, maybe it's an event where a lot of these recommendations, we don't have answers for them yet, but they're exploration.

What is it we can do thinking outside the box, bring into Fort Wayne, bring into our community, and maybe we already have those assets and they just need to grow or maybe it's something new.

And hearing too that in these six areas that this is a chance to reach back out to organizations that were participating in the plan, knowing that an arts united or a downtown improvement district or the landing, or when I call any coalition of the willing Greater Fort Wayne, are now able to be participants with you, And yet they're coming alongside us.

We know where our lean is.

We know and understand tourism, but we need those partners to come alongside us and they are willing to do so.

And we're having those conversations and having them participate in the conversation and leading those because we are not experts in all of these areas.

We know tourism and what brings in people and brings in visitors, but we want to support that and bring that perspective, but also rely on those experts within our community, like the partners that you've mentioned.

When I think of proximity to a lot of activity downtown and conferences can break out anywhere.

But when you realize that you have a Grand Wayne Center near a growing base of hotels in the downtown space and this gets us to the group business bucket, you talk about how all of that seems to have had alignment with intention.

Okay, So group conventions, tournaments, that is one area that really helped us stay afloat during COVID.

It helped us rebound quickly as Jill had mentioned earlier, and so we realized the assets we do have here and I don't think a lot of residents realize the conventions that we're bringing into town.

We have national wheelchair basketball coming in with Turnstone.

We have, you know, great hobby groups coming into our community and they're often coming in during the winter times and they don't have a lot to do.

So that kind of really ties in with the winter activation.

But overall, the looking at the Allen County War Memorial Coliseum and looking at the Grand Wayne Convention Center, what's the future of those buildings?

What can we do to continue to be relevant in the tourism space but also continue to attract those groups and the money that they bring into our community when they stay and they go to our restaurants and go to our shops and go to our attractions, when to continue that growth and continue those opportunities in bringing those opportunities to our community.

And then the second part is the sports tourism.

So that's a great area that we love to support locally.

We have some great, you know, amenities that you can have a soccer field in, play with your team, you can go out to a swimming pool, you can enjoy those.

But we also bring in tournaments to those facilities and what are the needs that those facilities are needing that they haven't been able to capitalize on?

Maybe they need lights, maybe they need turf and looking at an entity to help kind of collaborate and bring those conversations together.

Yeah, and I know it is always a fear.

And in a conversation of this kind it to leave out a venue and as you mentioned Grand Wayne Center or - I'm sorry - Allen County Coliseum and the the expanded conference space out there.

This is a lest we forget and I'm sure I'm forgetting somebody else after that.

So apologies in advance will keep the conversation going.

But certainly regional tourism development is the thing where we are all connected in this circle and whether this is the Regional Chamber or Greater Fort Wayne or fill in your collaborative here.

We have lots of folks who go across county lines.

Exactly.

So we don't want the plan to only focus on one sort of area of our community.

We know there's amazing assets all around the county and how can we support those communities and tell those stories, tell those stories that are unique to each of those so not know, solidifying one story for each of them, but really defining for each story that they have that's unique.

So New Haven with their canal history and looking at their sports development from Huntertown and the unique little neighborhoods that we have in to our community, how can we help those areas to find their story, but also promote that to visitors that there are coming here and helping distribute them out into those communities like Grabill?

Yep.

I'm thinking of parks, recreational spaces.

Trails have been a huge thing here of late.

And so we are back to another natural resource with riverfront development and a whole show and six more could be done on that alone.

Yeah, we have some amazing assets in our community with these three rivers that traverse our whole county.

And so looking at those and knowing that those two, those assets are kind of what came atop for people's interest and how can we bring more development and activation to those areas.

So not only having places for people to eat, people to stay, maybe there's housing along in those areas.

What are some things that will bring people to go and do and stay longer into those areas?

Activations, festivals, events, maybe attractions, more things to do where it was, what we kind of heard a lot in our conversations is how can we bring on more things to do in the riverfront area to, one, enjoy the waterfront, enjoy those river assets that we do have, but also, you know, get out and see the community more so across the board.

I think everyone can see themselves at a restaurant or a venue that hasn't been constructed yet, but it's going to be coming fairly, fairly soon, I'm sure, which gets us to the last of our six.

But no less important - tourism product development.

Not sure what I just said.

So that's an overarching title really to pull together the recommendations that are looking at new products or products that we do have in our community that need uplifted.

So looking at the winter activation that kind of is carrying over into this bucket as well.

But looking at also music economy, our music scene here in our community is an amazing asset.

What can we do to help uplift that community, help bring in more visitors to that are interested in that, but also tell that story and support what we do have in our community.

Sweetwater is a great example and helping bring in a lot of musicians to our community.

And do they have those opportunities to share their art with others, with residents, with visitors?

And so we want to uplift that.

What else would you say, Jill?

That's one of your favorites.

Oh, well, all of it.

Its a big job.

It just is doing a fantastic job.

One thing that I know we both want to be sure to share about the tourism master plan, This is very important for us to have residents in mind with this first.

All of these quality of place initiatives, as well as our collaborating partners in economic and city community development.

We think of our residents first.

We have a saying in the tourism industry.

What's good for residents will always be good for visitors, but the opposite is not always true.

So we're talking about responsible growth in this to sustain that visitor spending that really impacts all our residents and their quality of life and helps with attracting our new population members, new workforce, new business investment.

So visitor spending is important and the groups really go a long way with that.

We're super excited.

You brought up venues and 44 different venues were used last year to host over 256 events, just group business and we have a sales team, so we complement our partners in that.

And the economic impact of our sales team alone in groups was $11.6 million just for the groups, the 56 some that we were able to bring in out of those 200 some.

So we're proud of our work and just as should be commended with the plan and the work and her tying her communication skills with earn media to get recognition back to this plan and our efforts.

And we're ready to hit the ground running well and something which we want to take advantage of the segue I am holding up the analog copy, but you can find a digital version of this.

Tell them what I have here.

You have our visitors guide that we put together every year.

It includes a lot of our partners in our industry, but also tells the stories that we are sharing out in our marketing and advertising.

So when people are looking for things to do, looking for places to eat, places to stay, they can pick up this visitor guide from the visitor center or by requesting it online.

And it is an award winner in exactly two consecutive years.

Indiana State Tourism Award for Best Visitor Guide with out-of-state judges, one being Simon and Schuster Publishing.

So we're all very proud of that, and we're up a lot of our competing destinations in Indiana and two years running.

So it's a great piece.

It's wonderful.

And it is something that can be ordered.

There's an interactive page online.

There it is.

You can see it.

That's the click here and let the computer turn your pages version.

So it is available online, which is great.

And there is still a thought, too, that you don't have to be from out of town to enjoy the idea of being a visitor.

I think most are familiar with that phrase about being a visitor in your own hometown, and that is alive and well.

Yes.

So we host an event every September.

It's usually the Sunday after Labor Day.

It's our 25th anniversary this year, so you can enjoy be a tourist in your own hometown.

We hope you come out and enjoy us.

And it's a great day to explore our attractions that many of our visitors coming to enjoy.

So you get to get to know those experiences offer free.

So we have some wonderful attraction partners who open up their doors to our residents to show off what they do every day for visitors and help the fun get out and explore your community.

So for both of you, were there any surprises along the way in the in the research, anything where you thought, Oh, I was surprised by the number of residents that really participated and put a lot of thought in the survey and to hear their passion for their city and see their answers about the future of the city they would like that impressed me and the overall accessible foundation of the plan.

We have a lot of nonprofits more than any other city per capita that focus on disabilities, and I think we're leaps and bounds ahead of other communities destinations.

So we're going to see where that goes for accessible tourism.

For you, Jessa?

I'd echo probably the accessibility.

I think we all felt it in our hearts that this is something we celebrate and we want to support and having that validation from the community as well as our consultant, seeing it for themselves and coming in the site tours and having those conversations.

And they really felt that support in our community.

And I think that's not something I was surprised about, but also just really helped validate in our minds that this is something we should go after.

You know, you kind of have that humble thinking that we're not great.

I mean, there's always room for improvement, but having that validation from others that know this is something you should be celebrating and should be growing is just very exciting.

Welcoming, inclusive community for visitors.

In our final minute, tell me what happens next with the plan.

So next is that we're having those conversations with our partners and making progress already so you can go to VisitFortWayne.com/ tourismmasterplan and see updates there as well.

We're updating it probably about monthly.

So don't pressure for daily work because it's going to take a long time.

We've got ten years of work to do here.

So we're having those conversations, putting in the work.

We have four recommendations, as Jill has mentioned, that Visit Fort Wayne is focused on.

But there's, you know, many other recommendations our community is focused on supporting and looking at family attraction product or looking at the music economy.

So we're excited.

We wish you well.

Thank you very much, Bruce.

Congratulations, certainly for your first plan.

And it's a biggie, but it's a goodie.

We rely on a lot of people.

Thank you for having us.

Our pleasure.

Jill Boggs, Jessa Campbell, both with Visit Fort Wayne.

And for all of us with PrimeTime, I'm Bruce Haines.

Thank you for watching, but we'll see you next week.

Good night.