Focus Group: Tourism
Thanks to all that participated on February 13, 2015 in Marin Economic Forum’s focus group on tourism and destination management. It would be great to get your feedback on the following, and any edits as you see fit on the draft conclusions below:
- What is missing from these answers?
- Are there more specifics to consider?
We have retained all the information provided by the group on each of the following questions. We did not discuss how to achieve these goals on purpose, as that would have taken a much longer session and the point of these focus groups is to ignite a broader conversation via our blog and social media. Please e-mail any comments to the following e-mail: destinationmarin@marineconomicforum.org
We encourage your comments below!
What are infrastructure needs to help support or expand Marin County tourism?
- Transportation: getting visitors around Marin County quickly, efficiently, and as environmentally sound as possible
- Attractions: Iconic to Marin, preserving these
- Jurisdictional Coordination between cities and county
- Facilities (for visitors): can infrastructure be expanded to help visitors and not infringe on residents?
What are the largest challenges to supporting or expanding Marin County tourism?
- Marketing: Local/Regional market niche
- Politics/Policy: community education and commitment to visitors helping Marin County
- Transportation: difficult to connect all the transportation needs
- Funding/Money: resources to fund augmented infrastructure
What information do we want to find out about visitors in Marin County?
- How much do tourists spend?
- Where do tourists go?
- Who are the tourists (demographically)?
- What improvements are needed and where?
- How do tourists find out about Marin?
- Where do tourists come from?
- Will tourists come back to Marin?
- Community: attitudes, behavior, and knowledge from survey data
In what ways can more overnight visitors be attracted from the natural flows through Marin on their way to Sonoma and Napa counties?
- Improve Marin Center as an actual destination
- Create a more unified marketing and economic development program
- Increase and consolidate agriculture (and related industries) focus along with beer and wine
- Better highlight existing products and events/attractions unique to Marin
- More focus on active sports, mountain biking, skating, water (kayaking, etc.)
Alejandro Moreno S.
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What are the largest challenges to supporting or expanding Marin County tourism?
Why 101 of course, our main (and only) corridor, especially during “rush” hour. I don’t know that there is a bigger challenge both literally and figuratively, except for maybe politics and the NIMBY crowd.
Ann Gusiff
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One more thing for what we need to find out is HOW the tourists are getting here. We have bicyclists, cars, passengers in tour buses, etc. Obviously certain destinations necessitate certain modes of transportation. Knowing, for example, that 20% of tourists to Sausalito came via car, 30% via bicycle and 50% via tour bus could be helpful and instructive in figuring out what to promote from there.
David Zwicky
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You can attract more overnight visitors or nighttime visitors in general by developing and promoting many more “afterhours” venues for the younger crowd. Come during the day for outdoor activities and stay for the nightlife… Parking is cheap and available or have a party bus making pounds from the Ferry to the venues (if you don’t want the driving hassles). Do it jointly with the artwalk or some other special events, hotel packages, the works!