Designing the Future

Once the homework (assessment and analysis) is finished, it’s time for the fun and creative part of the process.  Egret will manage this “designing the future” phase to be highly interactive, with an understanding that it is just as important to build an excitement and momentum as it is to craft a future that is practical and productive.

This is the meat of the project and has the biggest allocation of consultant time and interactive meetings. 

The point of envisioning the future will be to

1. Figure out a strategy to persevere and improve on the tourism products, experiences, marketing and target markets that Essex County (and each target community) is successful at now
2. Decide what needs to be done to strengthen products, experiences, marketing, target patrons that are underperforming but worth developing
3. Decide what new patron groups should be attracted and paint a picture of how they’ll fit into the existing tourism picture
4. Decide what new products and experiences might be developed that would improve each target community’s (and the overall destination’s) performance with existing visitors, and/or attract new visitors
5. Outline infrastructure changes that will help achieve tourism success
6. Imagine how each community’s (and the county’s) tourism leadership can work better together, communicate more effectively, and have a better process for making decisions
7. Think through issues requiring funding (how much is needed and where it comes from)
8. Address other issues and ideas that arise through the process
9. Paint an image of how each community’s (and Essex County’s) tourism image will look to visitors (precursor to branding)

This process is designed to collect visioning ideas, put them on the table for everyone to see, and then prioritize those ideas through interactive sessions.  The sessions will be tailored to reflect the communications styles of each group and to emphasize the issues and opportunities that seem most important to Essex County’s visitor industry and community.

At its completion, each target community will have painted a picture of a tourism future

• that is exciting (to both the community and potential visitors),
• that is “doable”,
• that will increase tourism’s short and long term profitability,
• that will generate specific benefits while minimizing impacts,
• that the tourism professionals and local community (including supporting agencies and organizations) are determined to achieve,
• that will improve each community’s (and the overall destination’s) relationships with its existing patrons and forge new and positive relationships with additional patrons,
• that has an understandable process for making decisions, and
• that has clearly defined leadership roles and relationships among the various parts of the tourism industry and community

Again, this part of the planning process will culminate in a document which will be posted on the project website.  This document will be styled in a manner that is easy to comprehend (without heavy tourism jargon) and that builds excitement and momentum.