The March 18th Guest Speaker

Posted by Doug Shureen

Sonoma County Tourism "Life Opens Up!"

Our guest speaker for March 18, 2021, was Claudia Vecchio, President and CEO of Sonoma County Tourism. Claudia has been with SCT for three years, which happens to coincide with wildfires, floods, and Covid-19, not the best foundation for visitors! She has 25 years of experience in the tourism industry. She has ushered in a new multi-year strategic plan to deal with these challenges with a new destination brand: “Sonoma County: Life Opens Up.”

Claudia gave us important information about tourism in Sonoma County. We are an amazing destination. Sonoma County is on Forbes’ bucket list of top 21 destinations. Conde Nast Traveler calls Healdsburg one of the top places to go in 2021. Prior to the pandemic, tourism brought $2.3 billion in direct and indirect income to Sonoma County. The pandemic has been a disaster for tourism. Tax revenue from tourism in Sonoma County dropped by 39% in 2020. 600,000 people lost their tourism-related jobs in California. Small businesses have been especially hard-hit. Rebuilding tourism is vital to Sonoma County’s recovery. SCT is working on doing just that. Claudia believes, and has the data to support that belief, that investing a dollar with SCT to advertise Sonoma County as a tourism destination yields $160 in dollars spent by visitors and $18.13 in total tax revenue! What an ROI!

SCT has worked hard to engage audiences during the pandemic. It has stayed in close contact with the Board of Supervisors, worked with the Economic Development Board, held town-hall meetings, engaged heavily in social media, and conducted photo-shoots, among other things. SCT is working hard to generate new interest in Sonoma County tourism and bringing people back to visit us. Economists think that tourism will rebound quickly. We are ready for a renewal and SCT is going to help make that happen.

Many thanks to Claudia for the great presentation and all of her hard working in getting Sonoma County back on top!

You may watch Claudia's Zoom presentation available HERE for the next week or so.