NRVRC staff and local Destination Marketing Organizations (DMO’s) have been working on a project that explores different models of regional tourism collaboration. The purpose of the project is to evaluate tourism models in order to increase collaboration and enhance the New River Valley as a visitor destination. Extensive research is currently being done on other regional tourism entities across the state of Virginia and evaluation of their pros, cons, and costs. The outcome of this project is to have a report that details the findings of the research performed on the different models of collaboration, potential joint marketing opportunities, potential regional collaborative projects, and recommendations moving forward for regional tourism. These findings will be presented to local governments as needed. It will be created and available on the Commission’s website for guidance purposes.
A demonstration project will be conducted during this process as a test subject for tourism collaboration. The Virginia’s Outdoor Lovers Expo will be examined as the test project for collaboration. Planning and coordinating for this event has been ongoing since June 2016 and the project team includes NRVRC staff and local DMO’s.
The project is part of a Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) “Building Collaborative Communities” grant that aims to increase regional collaboration. The project is scheduled for completion at June 2017.
For further information, please contact James Jones (jjones@nrvrc.org), 540-639-9313, ext. 203.