Tourism Talk blog

It is always gratifying to receive awards for the work you do. That way, you know someone is noticing and perhaps the effort you have put into a product or project has been valuable to someone. It seems a little more special and even more humbling when the work you have done during extraordinary

GRCVB’s 2020-2021 Annual Report has been released, and the online report includes summaries from each of the Bureau’s departments (Sales, Destination Services, Marketing and Communications, Public Relations and International Tourism, Sports Marketing, Administration and Marketing...

Yes, we know that rhymes. If you have a few minutes to invest, you might enjoy these video segments from last week's “Community Matters” program produced by The CW22. Host Bill LuMay interviewed GRCVB president and CEO Denny Edwards and GRSA’s executive director Scott...

We believe there are some people in our area whom every hospitality partner ought to know (or at least know about). And we're planning to introduce you to them in a series of Q&A interviews during 2021. Today we want to introduce you to Whitney Knollenberg, Ph.D., assistant professor in the

You’ve heard us talk about accessibility a lot in the past. As recently as Dec. 2020 we hosted Episode Three of our Meeting Professionals Summit Virtual Series, “From Leaders in the Field: Practical tips for making in-person and virtual events accessible.” In that episode, we...

In part one of the summary of the March 18, 2021, GRCVB/N.C. Restaurant and Lodging Association (NCRLA) virtual meeting, we noted the disparity in relief to the hospitality sector, as reported by Lynn Minges, NCRLA president and CEO. In this second segment, we are summarizing a document NCRLA has

In addition to the public projects and initiatives that you see regularly reported as part of the work of GRCVB, there are a few that go on behind the scenes designed to make our efforts more effective. One of those revolves around community engagement. In 2018, we formed an internal Community

In the last Tourism Talk blog post of 2020, we asked the GRCVB staff to reflect on 2020 and share the lessons they have learned, especially as related to tourism and the work we all do. You can read their responses here. Now in this first blog post of 2021, we asked them an opposite question and we

Do you remember that old Mac Davis song "Happiness is (an unnamed Texas city) in the Rearview Mirror"? We're going to paraphrase it to "Happiness is 2020 in the Rearview Mirror." With the end of this unexpected and unprecedented year in front of us and vaccines loaded onto...

We have been reporting on GRCVB's launch of a comprehensive marketing campaign supporting area tourism's rebuild and recovery, themed “Wish You Were Here” (WYWH), in Aug. 2020. Through WYWH messaging, we are doing our best to persuade potential visitors (individual families...