We’re proud to be a partner of the 2017 Larry H. Miller Tour of Utah, July 31 – August 6, 2017. Known world-wide as “America’s Toughest Stage Race™”, the race is one of the top professional cycling events in North America and shows off northern Utah’s beautiful scenery. This year’s schedule for the seven stages is as follows:

July 31 – Stage One: Logan
August 1 – Stage Two: Brigham City to Snowbasin Resort
August 2 – Stage Three: Big Cottonwood Canyon
August 3 – Stage Four: South Jordan City
August 4 – Stage Five: Layton to Bountiful
August 5 – Stage Six: Heber Valley to Snowbird
August 6 – Stage Seven: Salt Lake City

This year marks the 13th edition of the race. Visit the Tour of Utah website for information on stages and venues, the competition, and how to get involved as a fan.

Join us at this annual gathering of Utah’s tourism industry, sponsored by the Utah Office of Tourism and the Utah Tourism Industry, featuring general and breakout sessions on the latest in tourism issues and technology, with area discovery activities. Come network with old friends and meet some new ones!

SEPTEMBER 12 – 14, 2017
Uintah Conference Center in Vernal, Utah

Registration now open

Regular registration is $249 per person and includes all conference sessions, meeting materials, meals & breaks (except Wed. dinner)

Go to our conference page for more information on who should attend, a little bit about the sponsors, hotel information, the agenda, area attractions, planned field trips, Tourism Works Awards, and more.

A few fun Utah adventures our office has experienced lately –

From Derek Mellus:
Spent some time in mid-March with youngest my sister and her husband exploring the Grand Staircase–Escalante area. Our backpacking route was both challenging and inspiring as it weaved through slot canyons, up and over chockstones and across slickrock that spanned acres of the most beautiful country on Earth.

From Ben Dodds:
I went to Gooseberry Mesa with my 14-year-old son, David, and my brother, Sam, from Las Vegas. Gooseberry Mesa is an outstanding trail system just south of Zion National Park, and the views are incredible. It varies from single track between juniper trees to technical waves of slick rock. Most mountain bikers who I’ve talked to consider it one of Utah’s best rides. My son proclaimed, “Dad, this is like riding on the moon!”

From Andrew Gillman:
At the end of April, my wife and I visited San Juan County for the first time. In addition to a “deluxe” jeep tour of Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, we enjoyed perfect days for hiking in Hovenweep, Natural Bridges and Bears Ears national monuments and weathered near-freezing overnights camping under pristine dark skies in Hovenweep’s campground and dispersed on Bears Ears.

Celina Sinclair led a group of Chinese Tour Operators through the state and visited some of our National Parks and hidden gems, like the Homestead Crater.

Enjoy reading some fun and recent domestic PR coverage coming out of UOT:

• The National (Amtrak’s on-board magazine) — Zen and the Art of Organic Chili
  • The article is a result of hosting the journalist, Joshua David Stein, in September 2016, and features Hell’s Backbone Grill, highlighting the restaurant’s Buddhist history.

• Food Network, Chefs’ Picks: Butcher Shops
  • The article is a result of hosting Brad Japhe on the winter FAM and highlights Caputo’s — and Salt Lake City — as a top culinary destination with unique artisan purveyors.

• USA Today — Made in Salt Lake City: Flavors only found in Utah’s capital
  • The article is a result of hosting writer Keith Flanagan on our winter FAM trip and showcases Salt Lake City as a prime destination for artisan makers, restaurants, craft spirits and more.

• Shape.com — This Is What It’s Like Learning to Ski In Your Late 20s
  • The article is a result of hosting writer Samantha Lefave on our winter FAM trip and highlights Utah as a top destination to learn to ski in one of our top 100 publications.

Over the past 18 months, our office has participated in the Zion Regional Collaboration Clinics that bring together a broad range of stakeholders to address the future of tourism and the quality of life for local residents in the western Zion corridor. The clinics, led by Danya Rumore, Ph.D., and graduate students from the Environmental Dispute Resolution Program at the University of Utah, and made possible by funding from Roxie Sherwin and the St. George area Tourism Office, brings together city, county, state and federal entities to proactively plan for the future of the greater Zion region.

Quarterly meetings allow for discussion of timely issues, subcommittees (camping, transportation, etc.) tackle specific topics and the full group works to proactively address the future of the southwest corner of Utah.

One of the key insights is how interrelated many of these issues are.

For example, if hotel development occurs in outlying communities like Virgin or La Verkin, what transportation options are available for travelers to get into the park? What parking options exist to accommodate cars? As pressures occur in one area of this complex system, travelers naturally displace to another area, making a regional approach with strong coordination essential for balancing quality of life for residents, an enjoyable experience for visitors and continued opportunities to grow southern Utah’s tourism economy.

Ready for four days and 140 miles of unsupported backcountry adventure by mountain bike in southwestern Utah? UOT’s editorial section at visitutah.com/articles has the incredible story and video, which was recently posted by Outside Magazine. Read more about Knobby Tired Nomads: Bikepacking and how “Adventure begins where certainty ends.”

We all know how important having a great social media manager on your team can be. Checking and leveraging Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and other platforms every day is important to boost engagement, spread excitement and share your story — whether it’s a dedicated role in the office or just one of the many hats you wear. Regardless, it’s tricky to keep on top of the latest tools and understand the upcoming trends in the ever-changing world of social media.

The folks at Buffer (an online service to help clients drive traffic, increase fan engagement and save time on social media) created a useful article to illustrate the tools and traits that your social media manager should strive to achieve in the coming year. For example, the article mentions something that many perhaps don’t realize they need if they are “behind the computer screen” all day: public speaking.

With the growing importance and popularity of live video content, your social media manager should be able to comfortably speak in front of a crowd or camera in a charismatic way.

The article also touches on the importance of strong customer service and community engagement skills, a good understanding of analytics, as well as much more.

With the growing popularity and improved technology surrounding virtual reality (VR), it is no surprise that businesses around the world are finding new and clever ways to use this great resource to sell their products. A case in point is a recent article by Skift (“the largest industry intelligence platform providing media, insights and marketing to key sectors of travel”) which delves into the story of how Navitaire, a reservation system for low-cost carriers, is using VR headsets for travel searching and booking.

As this article explains, Navitaire is taking VR one step beyond what travel giants like Marriott are doing with VR to show you travel destinations, to actually booking hotel rooms after a virtual tour and selecting flights by touching the planes “zooming” by you as you wear the headsets. Wearing special gloves, users can scroll through their calendar to pick travel dates and complete purchases by virtually swiping their credit card in the virtual world.

The mission of the Utah Cooperative Marketing Program is to leverage state and co-op
partner funding to attract out-of-state visitors to increase tourism expenditures.

The Round 17 Traditional Co-op Application Program is now open.  This program is available to destination marketing organizations (DMOs) and non-profit tourism-related entities for 1:1 out-of-state matching marketing money.  The deadline for this round of applications is Thursday, June 22, 2017, and the cap per entity is $275,000.

Returning Applicants

If you applied for co-op money in the past three years you can access the program here: http://extranet.utah.simpleviewcrm.com.  That link is also available on our website here: http://travel.utah.gov/opportunities/cooperative-marketing in the Useful Links section.
Please note that there is still some development work going on with the application program that will be completed by the end of the week.  You can still access and work on your application in the meantime, but you may notice minor changes the next time you log in.  Webinar training is not required for returning applicants but is encouraged to learn about the changes.

New Applicants

Participation in a training webinar is required to gain access to the application program for all new applicants.  Please choose one of the times below and send me an email to sign up.  If none of these dates/times work for you, please let me know and we’ll schedule something else.

• Monday, May 22 – 9:00 – 10:00 am or 3:30 – 4:30 pm
• Wednesday, May 24 – 9:00 – 10:00 am
• Thursday, May 25 – 2:00 – 3:00 pm
• Friday, May 26 – 9:00 – 10:00 am

Dates to remember:

• Applications due June 22, 2017
• Oral Interviews July 17 & 18, 2017
• Awards announced on August 11, 2017

Visit our UOT C0-op Marketing Programs page for more information.

National Travel & Tourism Week is May 7-13, 2017 and serves to champion the power of our industry. Travel and tourism professionals from across the nation work throughout the week to promote the impactful contributions their markets and organizations make to the U.S. economy.

This year’s theme, the Faces of Travel, shines a spotlight on the power of travel by recognizing the millions of people who keep this industry strong.

Check out the U.S. Travel Association’s website for more information and a tool kit:
https://www.ustravel.org/events/national-travel-and-tourism-week