Jessica Cejnar / Today at 1:13 pm / Community

The visitor’s office shows how tourism in Del Norte fared during the pandemic

Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox’s home, Trees of Mystery, is featured frequently in Del Norte County’s tourism promotions. File Photo: Andrew Goff

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• • John Mayer Goes Outside – In Del Norte; Example of the artist’s Land Rover advertisement for the “Earned Media” advertising region

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John Mayer’s stint on Howland Hill Road for Land Rover was perhaps one of the most significant plugs for Del Norte County of the past year, but it was one of many.

The advertorial introduced Del Norte to a different audience and continues to impact posts on Instagram and Facebook, said Lynette Braillard, founder of LuLish Design, representative of the Crescent City-Del Norte County’s Chamber of Commerce and Visitors Bureau. However, this advertisement was part of an overall increase in Visit Del Norte website through promotions in Visit California, Google, the North Coast Tourism Council and other outlets, they told Crescent City Council on Monday.

Traffic on the Visit Del Norte website increased from 8,421 in FY 2018-19 – the website launched on April 1, 2019 – to 84,325 in FY 2019-20. In fiscal 2020-21, on April 14, website traffic rose to 143,691, Braillard said.

Visit Del Norte’s visitor numbers grew 901 percent from 2018-19 through 2019-20, she said. So far this fiscal year, website traffic has increased 70 percent over the previous year, Braillard

“During a COVID year, a pandemic year, we are still seeing tremendous growth in traffic,” she said. “And that’s only until April 14. We expect that to be a three-digit number by the end of the year.”

During their presentation in the year under review, Braillard and the Chamber’s Executive Director Cindy Vosburg shared some of the highlights of a year hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. According to Braillard, they measure success by collecting temporary occupancy or housing taxes, as well as sales taxes in Crescent City and Del Norte Counties.

Braillard said she also looked at Visit Del Norte’s traffic volume and found that the office’s paid advertising campaigns, social media impressions and engagements were all there to drive people to the site.

Braillard said they are also weighing the traffic to the chamber’s visitor center as well as the number of clicks links get on the Visit Del Norte website.

Not only does Visit Del Norte connect with Visit California – the state’s tourism marketing organization – it also works with the North Coast Tourism Council, the Humboldt-Del Norte Film Commission and the 101 Things To Do Guide, Braillard said.
Visit California now regularly publishes Del Norte content, Braillard said.

According to Vosburg, much of the traffic to Visit Del Norte comes from people who have viewed content on Visit California.

“The clues we get from Visit California from advertisements are where someone actually has to do something,” Vosburg told the city council. “You need to sit down and order a visitor guide. You send it to Visit California on a return card. Visit California sends us the information and we send our visitor packages to that person.”

Examples of Visit California promotions include an article on Enderts Beach, a California artwork that included Trees of Mystery, Klamath’s Golden Bears, and Crescent City’s murals, and a photo from Redwoods State Park by Jedediah Smith showing the North Shore section in the year 2020 Visit California leads visitor guide, Braillard said.

Coverage of Enderts Beach, California also led to an article about it in American Airlines’ in-flight magazine, Braillard said. Journey, Washington State AAA magazine, presented Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park A January 2021 issue of the San Francisco Chronicle featured Del Norte County’s redwoods rolled into one Top 10 the huge trees and SF Gate had one feature on Maitreya Village Hobbit Hole Vacation Rental.

“We’re always trying to push local businesses out of what they’re doing (as well as doing new and exciting things,” Braillard said. “Overall, over 75 percent of the pitches we gave Visit California were published. We hope that will increase – hopefully it will be 100 percent. “

Despite the pandemic, Braillard reported that for the quarter ended December 31, 2020, lodging tax in the county rose 44 percent. She said local tourism officials thought this was a mistake, but then discovered that the county has many vacation rentals that do better than hotels and motels.

In Crescent City, where most of these hotels and motels are located, the quarter ended December 31, 2020 was flat year over year, according to Braillard.

Sales tax has also increased during the year, added Braillard.

“Over the year sales tax rose 10 percent overall, and then the room tax actually only fell 19 percent,” she said, adding that those numbers weren’t bad given the general impact the pandemic had on the travel industry.

City councils praised their work, and Mayor Pro Tem Blake Inscore noted that Braillard is also the agent for the North Coast Tourism Council, which has since been renamed North of Ordinary. Del Norte County’s relationship with the North Coast Tourism Council has been strained over the past few years, according to Inscore.

“The investment we are making through this relationship with Lynette, which enables us to broad spectrum Visit California and represent the entire north coast, bring it to Del Norte County, and bring it to Crescent City, is nothing less than It’s amazing where I started the visitor bureau, ”he said.
Crescent City Mayor Jason Greenough also noted that hotel parking spaces in Crescent City appear full.

“I’m almost sure some of these people wouldn’t have been here if they hadn’t put the impressions in their laps to look at,” he said.

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