Center to increase marketing efforts
Over the past 10 years the Grand Lake Region Visitors Bureau has developed a nest egg and the organization’s marketing team has decided it is time to put that nest egg to use.
Executive Director Donna Grube told the Auglaize County Board of Commissioners last week that this year the bureau will spend $192,000 on marketing. She said 2021 lodging tax dollars, which funds the tourism agency, were comparable to 2019, which was a record year thanks in part to the 50th anniversary celebration of Astronaut
Neil Armstrong’s Apollo 11 flight to, and first steps on, the moon.
The bureau’s portion of the tax in 2021 totaled $231,520, just shy of the $249,800plus collected in 2019. In 2020, COVID affected travel plans, leading to a collection of $158,000.
Grube explained after attending trade shows in Indiana she learned many people bought campers during the pandemic and are in search of new campgrounds and places to visit. Grube stressed there are no admission charges for Ohio’s parks; she said plans call for advertising lo
cal attractions in “Long Weekends Magazine” and “Ohio Magazine.”
Bureau officials are also stepping up their digital ads and video campaigns.
“We are producing five videos this year,” Grube said.
One videos will be filmed in Wapakoneta,
and another in Celina. Grube said they hired local companies to produce the video. They plan to partner with Tourism Ohio for ads about St. Marys, New Bremen and Fort Recovery, and the cost of those ads will be split between the two.
“We may see a scene from New Bremen on a national ad,” Grube said, noting they will share the end product
to get more reach.
Another new tactic is a digital billboard south of Dayton on I-75.
Grube said concerns for this year are gas prices and issues related to Grand Lake.
“It definitely affects travel,” Grube said. Some people will only travel within the state due to gas prices.
Grube said it was an especially wet spring, but media portrayal of
the lake’s algal issues would have a larger impact. She told commissioners there was only one day activity at the lake was affected by those issues in 2021.
Development in the area remains strong. The Boardwalk Village, under construction in Celina, remains the latest example of growth in the area as phase one of that project nears completion.