South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority talks tourism and development

On Wednesday, October 1, the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority (CVA) hosted its first Tourism Today event. Members of the community met at the Indiana Welcome Center in Hammond in the W. F. Wellman Exhibit Hall. Guests were welcomed with fresh coffee and breakfast before the program began. South Shore CVA President Phil Taillon explained the idea behind the new quarterly series.

“We created this event to have a casual conversation about tourism. I picked up very early on that tourism is about creativity, energy, people, and just outside-the-box thinking. We came up with this event to really talk about all the different facets of tourism,” Taillon said. “Once a quarter, we’re going to get together and bring in a speaker that we think people will be excited to hear about, that’s going to provide them with information they may not know, and it’s going to cover all different types of tourism-related topics,” he said.

Taillon wants to focus on getting people who don’t necessarily live in the Region to care about tourism in Northwest Indiana. He hopes the series helps expand awareness about how tourism influences other sectors, from economic development to quality of life, noting that tourism plays a role in long-term community growth.

“Anybody who’s going to move to a community or invest in a community usually comes there to visit first, and usually that visit occurs through tourism,” he said.

The first event’s featured speaker was Leonard Hoops, president and CEO of Visit Indy, the official destination management organization of Indianapolis. He joined Visit Indy in 2011 and leads a team of 58 industry professionals who are charged with growing central Indiana’s nearly $6 billion convention, tourism, and event business.

Under Hoops’ leadership, Visit Indy has shattered all-time records for convention and tourism sales, been named the number one convention city in America by USA Today, and ranked as a top visitor destination by The New York Times. Hoops credits sports, conventions, infrastructure, and a thoughtful city layout with helping Indianapolis develop a successful tourism industry.

“You don’t need 1,000 years, you don’t need 200 years. You don’t need 100 years. You probably only need 15 – if you’ve got the right vision and the right investments – to make your destination stand out. That’s what I keep telling people in Indy. I think it applies to Lake County equally,” Hoops said.

Hoops also spoke about the importance of brand strategy, pointing to the process of marketing, awareness, interest, desire, and action. He discussed the often-overlooked strong economic impact that tourism has on communities.

“I think because we’re like an amalgamation of industries, you have to cobble that together to get travel and tourism. Tourism often doesn’t show up on the federal codes for industries, but individual pieces of it do. One of the odd silver linings of the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in Indianapolis, was that when all of a sudden nobody’s downtown, people noticed. It seems very real now that it’s gone. The disappearance of it made people really realize how impactful and valuable it was,” Hoops said.

After Hoops’ presentation, guests were given the opportunity to participate in a Q&A. Taillon said the CVA wanted the event to reach community leaders who can directly impact the future of tourism. Taillon invited elected officials, community leaders, developers, people who work in special events, and park employees from several different communities.

“Anybody who we think will get the greatest impact from the message is who we’re trying to invite. We’re going to continuously have strong invite lists and make sure that everybody in this room is someone that’s going to have the greatest impact on all of Northwest Indiana. We really want to focus on hospitality-related, tourism-related people, economic development, and elected officials. We want to make sure we’re getting our message to the right people who are decision-makers, and can affect the success of tourism in the future,” Taillon said.

For more information about the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority, visit www.southshorecva.com.