TDC/CVB Feb 8 meeting offered an in-depth look into the 2011 marketing strategies as well as an opportunity to check out the newest TV Commercials.

The Real. Fun. Beach commercials were created to hit specific markets and have two versions in rotation, aimed at targeting Couples and Families.

More Info Below

The 2011 Summer marketing strategy is slated to begin televised promotions in mid-April, and running through July.

The interrupted headline campaign, Real. Fun. Beach. will be resurrected through out this duration with a conscious effort being made to maintain continuity between print, television and online media outlets.

The Real. Fun. Beach. tag line will feature family fun at the beach and a second that features couples and other adults having year-round fun

The Real. Fun. Beach TV commercials will target Atlanta, Baltimore and Birmingham, with some overlap occurring in cities where Southwest Airlines ad campaigns are being televised as well.  Cooperative marketing with Southwest through out April, June and August will focus efforts to promote Panama City Beach in new markets now being serviced by the airline.

Overall goal is to reclaim our title as the “World’s Most Beautiful Beaches” and leave the mayhem from the past year behind us, once and for all.  The focus is on interactive media with an emphasis on driving people to their website, but general marketing strategies include specific media placements aimed to hit a variety of markets, during corresponding peak times.

50% of the media budget has been allocated for Broadcast, TV, Radio, VOD, Check-out  and more, with 20% going towards online (website, online display etc.)

Word on the street (and for “street” read inter-webs) is that Vision Airlines will begin offering non-stop flights through Northwest Florida Regional Airport, starting March 25.

The first question I had upon hearing this news was “Vision ….. Who?”

A brief background search on Vision Airlines quickly brought me up to date.

Vision Airlines, formerly Vision Air, is an airline headquartered in Suwanee, GA.

Originally started in 1994, the airline operated flights for their tour business, out of Las Vegas. Showing travelers the Grand Canyon, Marble Canyon, Hoover Dam, and Monument Valley, by utilizing the Dornier 228 and Dornier 328 aircraft.

In addition, during the summer months, Vision Airlines transports white water rafters to various destinations along the Colorado River. The expansion from a sight-seeing company, into commercial airlines opened up a world (pun-intended) of opportunity for travelers seeking lower fares, yet preferring a non-stop flight. Typically,  in my experience, it’s hard to find both. It seems that the lower my ticket price, the more stops I’ll end up with.

Vision Airlines Points Of Interest:

Pilots and flight attendants from Vision Airlines volunteered to fly in supplies and emergency crews to Haiti after the 2010 Haiti Earthquake. The airline loaded planes in Miami and Atlanta with rescue workers, search dogs, water and medicine.

On July 9, 2010, the United States government chartered a Vision Airlines jet to transport ten convicted Russian “illegals” (spies) to Vienna and collect four alleged Western spies in the largest known prisoner swap since the Cold War.

Currently, they are planning to add flights, both in-bound and out-bound, from Northwest Florida Regional.

The Cities-  currently list an impressive (and convenient) 11.

Current Cities:

Greenville-Spartanburg, SC

Knoxville, TN

Atlanta, GA

Louisville, KY

Little Rock, AR

Baton Rouge, LA

Savannah, GA

Fort Myers, FL

Birmingham & Huntsville, AL

Tampa/ St. Pete, FL

Macon, GA

In the coming months, there’s talk of Vision expanding travel to four additional cities.

The world is catching on to what we’ve always known.

Panama City Beach was just named as one of the “Top Ten Budget Destinations” for 2011 by AOL Travel.

Read Full Press Release After The Break

AOL TRAVEL NAMES PANAMA CITY BEACH ONE OF THE “TOP TEN BUDGET DESTINATIONS FOR 2011” Panama City Beach, FL., January 14, 2010 –

Recently heralded as one of five top value destinations for winter travel by CNN.com, Panama City Beach has now made the list of AOL Travel’s “Top Ten Budget Destinations for 2011.”

The article emphasized affordable accommodations and oil-free beaches, as well as mentioned two major events which occurred in 2010: the opening of Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport and a news-worthy visit from the Obama family.

“We are thrilled to add this recognition to Panama City Beach’s list of accolades,” states Dan Rowe, President/CEO of Panama City Beach Convention and Visitors Bureau. “With the wide spectrum of accommodations, dining and entertainment options offered here, we are proud that our REAL.FUN.BEACH. destination is considered an affordable hot spot for 2011.”

Panama City Beach was in good company, with domestic and international destinations like Montreal, Cancun and Washington, D.C. also making the cut for AOL Travel’s list, which can be viewed in its entirety  here

Photo Credit: Diane Sharp

Jan 11th’s TDC meeting offered an eclectic mix of information.

Starting with the Vice-President of the Canadian Snowbirds, Nancy Hopcraft,  who caught my attention with the mention of the ‘Birds working on a potential “Retiree Visa” allowing those who qualify an opportunity to spend more time in Panama City Beach (or anywhere in the Nation).  It’s a wonderful idea, and one that’s sure to bring about an economic boost but we’re looking at least 2 years, before hearing any final words.

Great News from the Bay Point Invitational! Last year, Bay Point Invitational, had been called on to help prove to the nation that our waters were open, and our seafood, edible. So they did. Opening up the event to include Swordfish, they had an industry celebrity chef cook up the fish right there during weigh-in.  You can’t beat that kind of freshness, creativity or ingenious marketing.

Bay Point stole the spotlight  by announcing their Classic Event in September, had 44 Boats involved and a quarter of a million in the purse, which enabled them to present a  $25,000 check to Beach Point Services.

Finally, we come to Spring Break.

The TDC marketing strategy for Spring Break, has been mostly focused on Social Media.

There’s a few other avenues being utilized as well and without further ado, we present The Plan.

An Online Lodging Survey is in the works to gather feedback in a timely fashion, with questions on whether the business is booking above or below last year. The reason behind this is to enable a quick response or changes to the program as needed.

Targeting Associated Press (USA Today, NY Times, National Morning Shows & CNN) to spread the word by content.

In regards to utilization of Social Media, the plan is to narrow social site efforts to maximize impact. How, you ask?

Good question:

Targeting 50 designated schools on the school’s Facebook page

Advertise on school’s Facebook page (creating a dialogue on page with actual posts, as well as advertisements)

Setting up a specific Spring Break Twitter account (only to be used for Spring Break topics, information, etc)

Creating a Re-Tweet gift card program at each targeted school. For example, if you attend school in one of the target markets, and you re-tweet a post from our Spring Break twitter, you will be granted a gift card. Note: not PCB specific gift-card.

Hosting Tweet-Ups.

What’s a Tweet-Up? To be blunt, it’s a real-life get-together, where people tweet about the event, while AT the event.

Tweet-ups are a huge marketing strategy, currently being used in Hollywood, and to great success.  Popular TV shows, new Movie releases, Political events- can all be found in the real-time world of Twitter.

Those in attendance today, raised some concerns over these efforts coming a little too late, mentioning that Maximum Campaign Mode is currently in full swing from Collegiate Marketing and that the TDC’s/CVB PR strategy of polls, surveys and social media, should have been launched in early December, before kids left for Christmas Break.

Personally, I find some validity in those statements and I’m interested in hearing you’re thoughts?

Should the TDC start the Public Relation campaign trail, before January?

Photo credit: tonyocruz.com

This is the first article in a series that explores 2011 Tourism Predictions for Panama City Beach.

Spring is right around the corner, and along with the knowledge of the coming season, we’re finding that our town is divided into three parts. The Optimists, The Pessimists and The Realists.

At times, it looks as though the Realists Team and the Optimists Team are on the same page, leaving the Pessimists to bemoan, well – everything.

For the most part, the Panama City Beach community is fanning those beginning sparks of excitement, while remaining optimistically cautious, over the vast potential of the 2011 tourism season.

Instead of sitting around speculating any longer, we decided to check in with some of PCB’s seasoned pro’s, those business savvy locals, who’ve been through this whole tourism thing a time or two.

Logically, one of the first places we would reach out to is Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport. Thankfully, our instincts paid off and we were lucky enough to catch up with the airport’s Executive Director, Randy Curtis.

He stated that trying to nail down official numbers for the 2011 season, is tricky considering the new airport is less then a year old, (which is exactly what the Media point-person from Southwest Airlines told me). However, Randy was willing to share their current estimates with us, based off the overall statistics taken from the July-August season in 2010, then compared to the old-airport’s numbers during the same monthly time frame, in 2009

As we’ve reported, in July-August 2009, the now dubbed “old airport” handled about 30,000 monthly passengers.

In 2010, however, during those same summer months, the numbers jumped to an astounding 83,000 passengers (per month) despite negative, national media coverage of BP’s oil disaster and the nations economical hardships.

Yet, even with our pristine beaches untouched by the oil, and the relentless national coverage, we maintained our appeal to vacationers, and in October 2010, we seduced 73,000 passengers into the new-airport’s, convenient location.

Impressive numbers, confirmed by the man who makes the airports success, his business. In an effort to sum up our conversation, Randy Curtis simplified the numbers-by stating that this year’s expectations are leaning towards “3x’s the number of passengers the old airport handled during the same time frame”

This is wonderful news to those Optimists, intriguing news to the Realists, and for you Pessimists roaming around out there, this news just translates into more of those “pesky kids” hanging out on your lawn.

Regardless, it’s a great start to our 2011 Tourism Predictions series.

In our next article, we’re following the sandy seashores to check in with Paul Wohlford, Vice-President of Sales & Marketing for the Resort Collection of Panama City Beach.

Northwest Florida International Airport is always a fun topic. Everyone loves to talk about it, read about it and quote words like “projected passenger travel” and “estimated” while throwing numbers around so fast, that even Superman is starting to look a little windburned.

While numbers and statistics are a necessary evil in the realm of progress, reports and city planning, I’m the kind of person who lives life in the blunt lane, so instead of telling me percentages, I need to know how these numbers translate into simple Good Move/Bad Move terms.

On the off chance, that you, too, might be this kind of person, let me translate the newest numbers from our lovely Northwest Florida International Airport.

Airport-technology.com noted that “Panama City-Bay County International is expecting to host 600,000 passengers a year by 2020.” and while we may not be to that point, just yet, that number isn’t as daunting as it could be.

Southwest Airlines and Delta Airlines, have both reported an increase in travelers coming and going from our terminals and really, you don’t even need a report from them to find out if the airport is doing it’s job or not. Just go visit. The parking lot is overflowing, there are people waiting to board at gates, and there’s a line to get a hot cup of joe. All these signs say one thing to me, Airport Busy, Bring Book, Big Wait.  Project Airport Relocation is a success.

Basically, our numbers are growing, and despite the chaos from earlier in 2010, we are still seeing a positive increase in passengers. I contacted a Southwest Airlines Communications and Emerging Media Specialist, looking for current numbers. The most recent numbers haven’t been posted from Southwest (publicly) since they typically work on a quarterly base, but I was directed to the RITA site.

RITA, stands for Research and Innovative Technology Administration. RITA offers vital transportation statistics and analysis, and supports national efforts to improve education and training in transportation-related fields. In short, it’s a Department of Transportation site.

The stats posted for Panama City/ International Airport reads as follows:

May 2010

• 11,000 Arrivals, Ranked 351
• 9,209 Departures, Ranked 364

*Ranked among 823 US Airports, 12 months ending May 2010

July 2010

• 91,000 Arrivals, Ranked 218
• 89,000 Departures, Ranked 220

*Ranked among 820 US Airports, 12 months ending July 2010

September 2010

• 158,000 Arrivals, Ranked 183
• 157,000 Departures, Ranked 183

*Ranked among 816 US Airports, 12 months ending September 2010

My call to the actual airport confirmed more recent numbers, listed from May 23 through Nov 30. The amount of passengers the airport has seen trolloping through its building, runs at a respectable 446,135.

To be blunt, the airport is doing great and the coming year has enormous potential. The sheer volume of passengers is likely to continue it’s upswing, improvements will be made at the Airport as seen fit, and traveling in and out of Panama City Beach has never been easier.

Interesting side note though, if you look at the numbers from July, it looks like people fly in to Panama City…but few fly out. Thank you America, you love us! You really love us! One way ticket to the Emerald Coast please!

Good news with regard to low cost air travel! On Wednesday, November 10^th 2010, Vision Airlines announced that it will begin offering low-fare, non-stop service next month to two destinations from Northwest Florida Regional Airport in Fort Walton. The two destinations will be Niagara Falls and Miami – and more than 100 business and government leaders showed up at the airport for the official announcement.

Niagara Falls will be a fantastic gateway for snowbirds from the north to escape to sunnier skies for the winter, with the Niagara Falls International Airport area catering to a large population of potential winter guests from Toronto and its surrounding area plus the Buffalo, New York region. With fares from just $79 each way this makes for a very viable and affordable option for both snowbirds looking to get away to Florida, and locals who would like to travel to Ontario, Canada and Niagara Falls.

As well as Miami with flights from Northwest Florida Regional Airport from $69 each way, Vision is expected to announce additional destinations in the next four weeks. Those flights are expected to start in early 2011. Clay Meek, director of sales for Vision Airlines says “We feel like it’s going to be a good fit and a successful service. We saw this as an opportunity not to change how people are traveling, but to give them a better alternative.” Vision Airlines also will partner will local businesses and restaurants on discount packages for airfares, stays in local hotels and condominiums, and amenities such as meals and golf. “Especially for an airline, the partnership with the local business community is imperative,” Meek said. “It’s a good partnership to help keep our airfares low and assist the local businesses to provide a good service.”

With Northwest Florida Regional Airport (VPS) being just over an hour away from Panama City Beach, the new low cost Vision Airline destinations can only mean good things for our economy and for us locals who like to have access to new places without breaking the bank!

Click here for more information on Vision Airlines.

Having doubled in size in just the last few years, BookIt.com is finally in a place big enough to house the talent needed to operate a serious contender in the web travel booking industry.  Originally in the Poeple’s First building at the intersection of Middle Beach Road and R Jackson Blvd, they were bursting at the seams with absolutely no room for expansion.  In a permanent home, everyone from the owner down to the call center reps are finally comfortable in a cutting edge, modern designed facility.

Being technology driven, I think it’s great that we have such a strong contender in the technology world employing over 350 people in Panama City Beach, Florida.  One of the managers mentioned that they are already at capacity and planning future expansion.  Someone asked me yesterday who all the people working there were.  203 of them are call center representatives with approximately half of them for customer service and the other half booking agents.  Good for them for not outsourcing that to a foreign country.

Another perk to the new facility is their state-of-the-art training room.  Before they only had room to train around 6 people at a time, now they can train around 30 at a time.  Each trainee has their own computer workstation and phone that’s exactly like the one they’ll use when they get “in the field,” so as to prevent “culture shock” as one of the trainers put it.  Training lasts between 2 and three weeks, depending on what and who they are training.

The BookIt site is a completely custom site developed onsite and hosted in two locations for redundancy, both outside of our area.  One of the data centers is in Dallas, TX.

BookIt’s booking portfolio ranges in Florida from the panhandle to Miami, but the bulk of their business is in the Caribbean.

With people on staff almost around the clock, they are open 365 days a year and only closed 5 hours each day.  This leaves them open from 7 am to 2 am central time Monday through Friday and 8:30 am to midnight Saturday and Sunday.

With BookIt being one of the larger employers in our area, it’s great to have them in Panama City Beach.  This is a business that would work anywhere, but because Bud Finlaw’s loyalty and dedication to our area, we get to drive by and see their beautiful building each day.  Their grand opening was this week and they look forward to many years of growth and booking vacations for relaxation starved travelers.

Flashbacks of 2008 gas prices chilled spines throughout Memorial Day weekend as costs jumped at the pump from the $2.20 national average. The popular Circle K, at the entrance of the Strip on Front Beach topped out at $2.49 for regular unleaded for the weekend, 13 cents higher than the weekend’s national average of $2.36. Still, that’s $1.44 a gallon cheaper than a year ago when fears of an oil shortage sent energy prices soaring. Cheaper gas means more driving, which bodes well for the Panama City Beach’s summer tourism season.

Last summer’s oil shortage cut 2008 travel significantly. Recently released Energy Department data says, November to November last year, U.S. motorists drove 53.2 billion fewer miles than they did over the same period a year earlier. Gas prices in 2008 affected travelers deeply. GfK Roper Public Affairs and Media polls showed 54 percent of Americans cut back travel in 2008 because of gas prices. But, the Energy Information Administration’s April 2009 report says retail prices for April through September in 2009 are projected to average $2.23/gallon. With that 40% decrease in the cost of gas, 2009 summer travel should see a significant boost.

AAA travel and auto group forecasted a 1.5 percent rise in travel compared with 2008 for the U.S. Memorial Day weekend, the unofficial beginning of the traditional summer driving season. The trend is expected to continue during the major summer travel holidays of the Fourth of July and Labor Day as lower fuel prices resuscitate the sensibility for folks to take a vacation.

If these predictions hold true, Panama City Beach should be a huge beneficiary of the travel trend. Drivers to Panama City Beach this Memorial Day weekend said the gas prices definitely impact their travel plans. “Gas prices change everything,” said Cindy Matheny, who drove to the Panama City Beach from Troy, Alabama to enjoy the weekend. She, with a car packed with kids, filled the tank of her van at the Chevron on the corner of North Lagoon and Joan Avenue. “We’ve come to Panama City Beach every summer. The price of gas determines how many trips we’ll take. You really have to weigh your options these days. Gas is still cheaper than last year and this economy needs the help.”