TDC Regular Meeting – March 20, 2017 Agenda Item 7 – Strategic Plan – Tera Meeks (Action Required) ‐ Review and Acceptance of Proposed Final Version of Strategic Plan presented by Herb Marlowe – Analytica
Review and Acceptance
of Proposed Final Version of Strategic Plan
presented by Herb Marlowe – Analytica
1
Draft 6.0 March 1, 2017
Vision
Desired Result
An annual growth rate of 10% in the tourist development tax.
Mission
The mission of the Tourist Development Council is to strengthen and grow the tourism sector of
the St. Johns County economy by:
a.
Creating and maintaining destination awareness that attracts visitors
b.
Promoting and supporting distinctive visitor experiences of everimproving
quality c.
Facilitating countywide tourism management planning
Roles
To fulfill its mission, the Tourist Development Council may assume the following roles:
Policy and strategy developer and implementer
o
Establish policy direction for market investments including growth and
maintenance strategies
Investor o
In marketing strategies, innovation or incubation of new products, and support
service or facilities that enhance the visitor experience
Public Fiduciary o
The TDC is responsible for the proper use of public funds, the determination as
to whether specific expenditures are helping create the desired result and the
determination of the ROI of the various program and marketing expenditures.
Innovation and Research & Development
o
Maintaining a competitive edge in this highly competitive field is key to long
term success. To assist the tourism industry to do so, the TDC may function at
times as an educator, at times as a researcher, at times as an investor in an
innovative product, at times as a source of incubation, at times as a network
developer to link together events or businesses for their mutual benefit.
Convener and facilitator o
The TDC can bring together various public and private interests to identify
Innovation
Fairness
Accountability
5
Diversify the range and type of experiences available to visitors
Maintain a high level of brand awareness
Promote an everimproving level of visitor experience
Leverage tourism investments to improve the overall economic condition of the county
6
Diversify the range and type of experiences available to visitors
To better achieve the desired result of 10% annual bed tax growth, a broader range of
experiences will be needed. One of the weaknesses the County faces is that some
visitors feel they have been there, done that and nothing new. Diversification will
address this weakness while adding additional reasons to visit the County in the first
place. The various diversification opportunities are presented below.
o
Sports tourism. Sports tourism encompasses amateur, professional, and
collegiate sports. Sports tourism accounts for 15% of all Florida visitors. In St
Johns County golf and fishing are the two dominant current forms of sports
tourism along with sporting events such as runs and various beach activities of a
sporting nature.
Active tourism. Active tourism can be considered a subset of sports
tourism with the distinction being sports tourism mainly refers to team or
group sports while active tourism refers to individual activities which may
or may not be done in a group. Fishing, bicycling, walking, running, hiking
are all sports which can be pursued individually or in some group form.
These may also be competitive or noncompetitive in nature.
o
Business/Leisure (Bleisure). This form of tourism consists of the person visiting
the county for business purposes but who chooses to extend their stay for
various leisure purposes. At the current time this is most often golfing or fishing,
but it could include any of the other experiences discussed here.
o
Signature Events. A signature event is one which draws national and
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o
Ecotourism. Ecotourism is nature based tourism. Obviously, beach based visits
are nature based. However, given their dominance in the state, the term is more
often used in the context of lesser used environments such as rivers or marshes
for kayaking, nature trails through parks and reserves, wildlife viewing including
birding, or visits to other natural spaces.
o
Cultural and Music tourism. This form of tourism covers a variety of venues
o
Heritage tourism. Heritage tourism focuses on the history of the community. St.
Augustine is a leader in heritage tourism. The question is how this leadership can
be strengthened and the experience improved.
Living history. Living history is a subset of heritage tourism which
emphasizes the use of reenactors to make history come alive. Re
enactors can be used for older historic periods, such as the Spanish
period, but they can also be used for more recent history such as the idea
to have golf reenactors, i.e. Bobby Jones, at golf courses that attract
visitors.
Archaeology. The opportunity to participate in a “dig” is a form of active
tourism which appeals to a niche market.
Architectural. One of the appeals of St. Augustine is its distinctive
architecture.
o
Local food and culinary tourism. There is a “foodie” subculture which is
8
Maintain a high level of brand awareness and feeder market sensitivity
The brand research conducted for this project indicates a very high level of brand
awareness in existing target markets. However, other feeder markets may not be as well
understood and the level of brand awareness in those markets may or may not be as high.
One intent of this goal is to maintain brand awareness in existing feeder markets while
strengthening brand identity in other markets. For this goal to be achieved, a richer
understanding of the potential markets and how to reach those markets will be needed.
This understanding will enable the TDC to determine which additional markets to pursue
and how to best invest its marketing resources to achieve the desired annual growth result.
The strategies for achieving this goal include:
o
Feeder market analysis. This strategy seeks to better understand existing or
emerging feeder markets, including international markets, and their
characteristics. It further seeks to understand which aspects of those feeder
markets could best meet the desired growth result.
o
Continuous marketing impact analysis. This strategy is a continuous analysis of
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Promote an everimproving level of visitor experience
The first two goals focus on getting people to the County. The focus of this goal is ensuring
they have a quality experience while they are in the County so that (1) they choose to
return and (2) they become “sales people” for the County by communicating their positive
experience. The TDC has a limited role and impact in the quality of specific venues. Those
businesses will prosper or not based on their own performance. What the TDC must focus
on, often in partnership with the responsible local governments and other institutions, is
the quality of the public experience: safety, cleanliness, accessibility, attractiveness,
appropriate space and the intangible but significant variable of feeling welcomed. Specific
strategies the TDC would pursue, in collaboration and partnership as strategy appropriate
include:
o
Trams and other forms of alternative transportation. Increasing access to large
tourism events by providing trams or some other forms of transportation to
relieve parking and congestion can improve the experience. Ensuring
coordination and communication of these alternatives is important for this
strategy to succeed.
o
Signage and circulation. Communicating signage needs to the appropriate
entity, supporting distinctive signage where needed and providing realtime
information about traffic and parking via apps are all tools that can improve the
visitor’s experience.
o
Coordinated event and experiences marketing. On any given day, and
particularly on weekends, there are a variety of experiences available in the
County. The opportunity is to leverage these various events so that they support
each other while providing a richer visitor experience.
o
Facility maintenance. Obviously maintaining facilities is important both for the
visitor experience and protection of an existing investment. Given the scope of
facility maintenance needs, it is important to clarify the TDC’s role and
responsibility in facility maintenance as well as the responsibility of other local
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o
Facility development. As with facility maintenance, facilities may well be needed
to develop a target market. The prime consideration here, other than financial
capacity, is the degree to which a facility will lead to the desired annual growth
result.
Leverage tourism investments to improve the overall economic condition of the
county
St. Johns County faces an ongoing structural shortfall of resources adequate to meet needs
and public expectations. This shortfall is due in large part to a comparatively low
commercial tax base. For the most part residential valuation is inadequate from the
perspective of needed maintenance and capital improvements. While the purpose of the
TDC is to strengthen and expand the tourism sector of the local economy, this can be done
in a way which helps build a stronger overall economy that has a better
commercial/residential ratio. This occurs in part due to the growth of tourism related
properties that enhance the commercial tax base. Some other strategies which could also
contribute to a better ratio are discussed below.
o
Growth of the music industry. In addition to the visitors it attracts, the music
industry itself is much broader than the music event itself. A wide variety of
supportive businesses (food and beverage, advertising, security, etc.) are needed
for events to be produced. As events expand in number or size, there is
commensurate growth in these support services. Beyond the support services
element, there is the creative class element which tends to draw related (or
unrelated) creative and entrepreneurial endeavors to an area. This can create a
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o
Sports capital. Just as music events require a support network, so do sports.
While there are direct hotel stay benefits to sports, a variety of services can
develop such as food and beverage, parking, security, advertising. The more
consistent, frequent, and sufficient scale sports events are, the more likely a
viable support sector will emerge. As with the music industry strategy, there will
be ultimate benefit to the overall economy and the commercial tax base of the
County.
o
Infrastructure development. Most TDCs in the state that have chosen to make
significant infrastructure investments have done so with the understanding that
residents may have some access to these facilities. This relieves to some degree
capital pressures on county government.
o
Financial sustainability and stability. The TDC must be prudent in its investments
Diversify the range and type of experiences available to visitors
o Sports tourism
Establish and charge a shortterm task force1 to be coordinated and
supported by the TDC Executive Director with the following
responsibilities:
Develop a recommendation for either a sports commission or
sports committee that includes:
o Role and purpose; o Staffing needs; o
Funding source and amount; o
Other logistical and planning topics.
Issue an RFP to conduct: o
an independent market analysis of sports tourism
opportunities appropriate to St. Johns County;
Including estimated return on investment (ROI) and
potential contribution to the desired growth result.
o
an independent infrastructure analysis to determine if the
County has the needed infrastructure for the priority
markets or could develop it.
As a subset of this analysis the potential for
partnerships and joint use development with
Flagler College and the County should be
considered.
o Business/Leisure
Charge the TDC Executive Director, with support as needed from
contracted agencies, to analyze the existing scope of business/leisure
travel in the County and determine opportunities and needed
investments to expand that category of travel.
1 Members could include current or former TDC members, a county representative, a Flagler
College representative and other interested parties. 5 to 7 members would be the preferable
number.
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Maintain a high level of brand awareness
o Feeder market analysis.
Charge the TDC Director and staff selected by the Director to:
Conduct a feeder market analysis; o
This would be a zip code/month analysis of 2016 lodging
stays organized to ensure confidentiality of provider data.
I95 hotels should be segregated with one night stay
classified as “drivethroughs” and two or more nights stays
classified as visitors.
Identify in this analysis those new feeder markets which have the
highest potential of growth;
Conduct, if needed, a brand identity survey in selected new feeder
markets
Identify marketing strategies most likely to be effective with the
target market;
Identify the cost of this marketing effort;
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential contribution to
the desired growth result.
Present a report to the TDC including recommendations.
Implement adopted recommendations.
o
Continuous marketing impact analysis.
Charge the TDC Director to develop, using any appropriate resources, as a
regular discussion item on the TDC agenda, a discussion of marketing
strategy by target market or technique. This discussion should focus on
impact, ROI, estimated contribution to the desired growth result as well
as alternative methods.
o
Target market understanding and marketing approach.
A component of the regular TDC agenda item on marketing, a substantive
discussion of the chosen target market and its submarkets should be
conducted. This discussion should focus on impact, ROI, estimated
contribution to the desired growth result as well as alternative methods.
Based on TDC discussion and direction, the TDC Director should direct
adaptation of marketing strategy.
15
Promote an everimproving level of visitor experience
o
Develop and adopt a TDC policy on Facility development and maintenance.
Charge the TDC Director with the following:
Review of legal parameters and current practices regarding use of
TDC funds for facility development and maintenance;
Review and refinement of criteria that the TDC would use to
consider facility development and/or maintenance funding;
o
Including an estimation of the (ROI) of such a project and
potential contribution to the desired growth result.
Review and refinement of a process and structure though which
facility development and/or maintenance funding needs can be
considered;
Provide a report to the TDC on alternatives or recommended
actions;
As a TDC agenda item hosts presentations or reviews of practices of other
TDCs with regard to facility development or maintenance.
These presentations or reviews should address the practices of
other TDC regarding development of sports facilities.
Adopt a policy.
Diversify the range and type of experiences available to visitors
o Signature event(s)
Charge the TDC Executive Director, with support from the Cultural
Council Director and Visitors and Convention Bureau President, to
prepare a report addressing the following topics:
Strategies and needed investments to further optimize the
existing signature event, the TPC championship;
Development of criteria for determining if an event would be a
signature event;
Identification of one or more existing events or potential events,
that have the potential to become a signature event or determine
that an additional signature event is not feasible now;
Determine priority if more than one is identified;
Develop a business plan for the top ranked possibility that would
identify needed startup resources and the potential “owner” and
“manager” of the event;
Estimate the (ROI) of such an event and potential contribution to
the desired growth result.
o Ecotourism
Charge the TDC Director, in collaboration with County recreation staff.
State parks staff and other entities as determined by the TDC Director to
be needed, to develop an analysis of the needed investments and
potential ROI to further develop and market a blueways/greenways
attraction.
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o Cultural and Music
Charge the TDC Director, in collaboration with County staff and contract
staff, to conduct a marketing study of potential event growth for the
Amphitheater, the resources need to achieve that growth and the
estimated ROI and contribution to the desired growth result of that
investment.
Charge the TDC Director to establish as work group tasked to:
Identify musicrelated industries that would be a good fit for St
Johns County;
Identify approaches to engage in an active outreach to those
industries;
Identify the resources need to engage in the outreach;
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential contribution to
the desired growth result.
o Heritage tourism.
Living history
Charge the TDC Director to establish a work group tasked to:
o
Develop a broad reenactment strategy that would have
countywide features; o
Identify opportunities to use reenactments as an
attraction in the less busy times (such as midweek);
o Develop a promotion strategy; o
Develop funding criteria; o
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential
contribution to the desired growth result.
Archelogy
Charge the TDC Director, in collaboration with the City of St.
Augustine archeologist, to:
o
Identify opportunities to expand visitation related to
archeology;
o Identify promotion opportunities; o
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential
contribution to the desired growth result.
Architecture
Charge the TDC Director, in collaboration with appropriate staff
to:
o
Identify opportunities to expand visitation related to
archeology;
o Identify promotion opportunities; o
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential
contribution to the desired growth result.
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o Local food and culinary tourism
Charge the TDC Director to establish a task force of stakeholders and staff
to:
Identify marketing strategies to support that expansion;
Identify the needed resources to support the expansion;
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential contribution to
the desired growth result.
o Agtourism
Charge the TDC Director to meet with local Farm Bureau, IFAS and the FL
Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services to examine:
The feasibility and value of an agricultural tour or roadway of the
food and liquor products of the County;
Methods to expand the number or scope of local food/beverage
producers;
Ways to promote the development of local culinary resources that
draw upon the local agricultural economy
o Family based tourism
Charge the TDC Director to meet with hoteliers, attractions, restaurants
and other stakeholders to identify:
Current family visitation patterns;
Additional activities or activity gaps that families have identified
as being of value;
Resources that would make the County more attractive to families
Estimates of needed investments.
Prepare a report to the TDC summarizing this discussion that includes:
Priorities if any;
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o Wedding tourism
Charge the TDC Director to meet with stakeholders in the Wedding sector
to identify:
Current wedding activity patterns;
Additional features that wedding parties have identified as being
of value;
Resources that would make the County more attractive to
wedding parties;
Estimates of needed investments.
Prepare a report to the TDC summarizing this discussion that includes:
Priorities if any; o
Estimates of the (ROI) of such an effort and potential
contribution to the desired growth result.
20
o
Continue market analysis based on 2017 findings and discussions.
21
Promote an everimproving level of visitor experience
o
Trams and other forms of alternative transportation.
Charge the TDC Director with the following:
Review of legal parameters and current practices regarding use of
TDC funds to provide transportation services;
Convene a stakeholder group to determine when and where
improved transportation would provide a significant benefit;
o
Coordinate with the appropriate parties on a budget for
transportation services;
o
Identify the party responsible for coordinating and
managing the transportation services;
o
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential
contribution to the desired growth result;
If there is sufficient addedvalue, approve or bring to the TDC an
agenda item approving such an investment.
o Signage and circulation.
Charge the TDC Director with the following:
Convene a stakeholder group to determine where additional
signage would be needed. This group should include those entities
responsible for signage.
o
Develop with this group a plan for improved signage.
o
Determine the cost estimate of improved signage
o
Determine if and where the TDC should costshare.
o
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential
contribution to the desired growth result.
Provide a report to the TDC on recommended actions.
Enact any approved actions.
o
Coordinated event and experiences marketing.
Charge the TDC Director with the following:
Convene a stakeholder group to determine issues and
opportunities for more coordinated marketing.
Develop with the group recommendations for improvement,
including any resources that would be needed;
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential contribution to
the desired growth result.
o Facility maintenance.
Charge the TDC Director with the following:
Review of legal parameters and current practices regarding use of
TDC funds for facility maintenance;
Review and refinement of criteria that the TDC would use to
consider maintenance funding;
o
Including an estimation of the (ROI) of such a project and
potential contribution to the desired growth result.
Review and refinement of a process and structure though which
maintenance funding needs can be considered;
Provide a report to the TDC on recommended actions;
Enact any approved actions.
o Facility development.
Charge the TDC Director with the following:
Review of legal parameters and current practices regarding use of
TDC funds for facility development;
Review and refinement of criteria that the TDC would use to
consider facility development funding;
o
Including an estimation of the (ROI) of such a project and
potential contribution to the desired growth result.
Review and refinement of a process and structure though which
facility development funding needs can be considered;
Provide a report to the TDC on recommended actions;
Enact any approved actions.
o Language diversity.
Charge the TDC Director with the following:
Convene a stakeholder group to determine issues and
opportunities for improved language diversity;
Develop with the group recommendations for improvement,
including any resources that would be needed;
Estimate the (ROI) of such an effort and potential contribution to
the desired growth result.
o Workforce training.
Charge the TDC Director with the following:
Convene a stakeholder group to determine issues and
opportunities for improved workforce training;
Develop with the group recommendations for improvement,
including any resources that would be needed;
Leverage tourism investments to improve the overall economic condition of the
county
o Music industry
The objectives discussed in the expansion goal would address this
strategy.
o Sports capital
The objectives discussed in the expansion goal would address this
strategy.
o Target industry conventions
The objectives discussed in the expansion goal would address this
strategy.
o Infrastructure development
Working with the appropriate public bodies, conduct an analysis
of what additional facilities (bathrooms, parking, etc.) that would
improve the visitor experience.
o
Provide a findings report to the TDC which would include
whether there is an appropriate funding role for the TDC.
Conduct a feasibility analysis of a performing arts center
o
This analysis should include Including an estimation of the
(ROI) of such a project and potential contribution to the
desired growth result.
Examine the feasibility of a tourism business incubator.
o
If determined feasible include a business plan for the
development of such an incubator Including an estimation
of the (ROI) of such a project and potential contribution to
the desired growth result.
o Financial sustainability and stability
The TDC Executive Director is charged with:
Providing relevant information and education materials should
the City of St. Augustine seek the authority to levy a historic
preservation bed tax;
If the desired growth results are obtained, at an appropriate time
in the future the continued relevance of the county ordinances
regarding the bed tax should be placed on the TDC agenda for
discussion.