COMMUNITY COMMENTARY

Rosalind Williams

With summer over and many of the leisure visitors returning home, the

Newport Beach Conference & Visitors Bureau has directed its efforts

toward other sources of business.

The great news is that the transient occupancy tax is up 28% for the

first quarter of the fiscal year. The OK news is that hotel occupancy is

flat. So what does that mean? Visitors are paying more to stay with us,

but the number and/or length of visits has not increased. This is not

atypical of the conference or meetings market versus that of the vacation

visitor.

What has the Newport Beach Conference & Visitors Bureau done about that?

We conducted sales trips to Los Angeles, San Francisco and Chicago,

meeting with 87 prospective clients. We attended six trade shows,

conducted four familiarization trips for 68 meeting planners, tour

operators and travel writers. We presented the concept of Newport Beach

as the travel destination of choice to media in New York City, London,

Hamburg, Frankfurt and Munich. We placed 10 print ads in trade

publications, secured inclusion of Newport Beach on the Wheel of Fortune

game show and helped to reestablish the Newport Beach Film Festival.

The results of these efforts netted the Newport Beach Conference &

Visitors Bureau 750,000 hits on our Web site, thousands of booked room

nights and associated revenue and very high visibility three months

running in Sunset Magazine, the upscale authority for the West Coast

traveler.

In short, we’ve been busy.

On the immediate horizon is the exciting Diners Club Masters Golf

Tournament coming to Pelican Hill in December and the annual Christmas

Boat Parade. Each of these events will produce an increased awareness of

Newport Beach. Every bit helps when we go up against destinations like

Palm Springs and Santa Barbara or anywhere fabulous, USA. In the

meantime, city expenses are mounting and so must revenues. We will do our

part to ensure that tourism keeps pace.

Stay tuned. I’ll be back with another update next quarter.

* ROSALIND WILLIAMS is president and CEO of the Newport Beach Conference

& Visitors Bureau.