Good Day,
I love this industry. More specifically, I love the people that work in this industry. We seem to share a common bond that allows us to open up and learn from one another, sharing secrets to success and unabashedly talking about things that didn’t work the way you had hoped. Perhaps this comradery is rooted in the psyche of the types of people that choose to work in roles focused on the happiness of strangers. Or maybe our shared experiences, from amazing stories of staff going that extra mile to make a guest experience incredible to the insane tales of guest antics that causes your jaw drop, make us feel like we are all in the same club. But whatever it is, this industry gets in your blood and is hard to shake.
I see examples of this every week. Our tourism symposium, especially the networking breaks, demonstrated our wanting to connect with each other. The volume swelled as conversations erupted at every table, in the break room and during happy hour. In many cases, the people deep in conversation didn’t know each other before the start of the event and were now sharing their thoughts on whatever topic was important to them, picking each other brains for ideas.
I was at TIAO’s Opportunities Forum, which had incredible speakers talking about how technology is and will be integrated into our industry. What was interesting about this scary topic is that it got me speaking with some of the attractions that were at the event. What we confirmed with each other is that the unexpected benefit of AI and Chatbots for these attractions is an increase in the number of calls each of them is receiving. While we don’t have any proven data as to why, it seems like people are skeptical about what they see online and want to hear from a human that works there. One of the attractions had to change their training so that their staff could reference old promotions that AI was finding and presenting as valid to people searching for online information. This willingness to quickly share experiences allowed us to collectively explain what we were experiencing to the rest of the room and the presenters. Maybe there will be some research done on this in the future.
Our region has a great new attraction in Stouffville called GlowTown. It’s an amazing 18-hole mini golf course and arcade. While I met them as Central Counties, I was able to share with them some tips from my experience opening and operating GlowZone 360. This past week was their first March Break and we spent a lot of time texting back and forth. They were very busy on Monday and I was able to let them know from our experience that every day of March Break is busier than the last. By Friday, the owners were exhausted, but happy about their successful week. We compared numbers and are planning to meet in the coming weeks to talk more about some of the operating procedures we have found work at our locations.
And my shining example of how this industry sticks with you is a call I received from the Tourism Golf Group (TGG). As it turns out, the TGG is a group of retired tourism professionals – many of them my mentors – whose working relationships developed into lifelong friendships. They were chatting one afternoon in December (probably about the “good old days”) when they hit upon the topic of golf tournaments. It didn’t take them long before they hatched a plan to organize and run a fun tournament for all of us in the industry, retired or not. They want to give back to the industry while also supporting a great charity, the Starlight Children’s Foundation Canada.
The Starlight Foundation is dedicated to brightening the lives of seriously ill children and their families. When the kids are out-of-hospital, they focus on granting wishes of all sizes with our Day Brightener Wishes, Great Escapes® Wishes, and Once In A Lifetime Wishes to make sure Starlight families always have a reason to believe in magic. Members of the TGG called me because they knew I would want to help make this tournament a reality. They weren’t wrong. So now we have a group of retired tourism professionals, myself and Carol Greenwood from TIAO, volunteering to make this tournament a reality.
And, of course, you can help in many ways:
- Mark September 16 in your calendars and join in the fun
- Consider being a sponsor of the event or let me know if you think of an organization that may want to sponsor
- Donate an experience to the Starlight Children’s Foundation Canada
- If you don’t golf but want to be there, consider being a volunteer for the day
More information about this fun day will be coming out shortly. You can email me directly with any questions (at cthibeault@centralcounties.ca) or email the committee at their brand new email address – tourismgolfgroup@gmail.com. If you don’t get to me first, there is a good chance I will be reaching out to you to see how you can be part of this amazing day of giving and comradery.
Have a great day!
Chuck
