Telling Loudoun County’s Story, with Beth Erickson
Beth Erickson has served as the President and CEO of Visit Loudoun since 2014. Visit Loudoun is in Loudoun County, Virginia and in 2016 alone, they generated almost $1.69 billion in travel spending and supported more than 17,000 jobs in the travel industry and adjacent businesses. Prior to her current position with Visit Loudoun, Beth…
Your Guide for Marketing in 2019, with Nicole Mahoney
Putting a marketing plan together may seem like a daunting task, competing with your daily must-do list and everything else vying for your attention. But without a plan, you are just wandering in the desert and hoping for outcomes you haven’t clearly defined. Planning is a necessity in order to grow and sustain your business….
Doing PR Like a Method Actor, with Nancy Marshall
Nancy Marshall has been doing PR since the early 1980s. She founded her agency, Marshall Communications, in 1991 serving tourism and especially outdoor recreation clients. Since then, her agency has grown significantly and now her and her team handle the state of Maine Office of Tourism and state of Maine Department of Agriculture, as well…
Making the Best of a Beautiful Situation On a Budget, with Caroline Boland and Gary Curran
Caroline Boland and Gary Curran together run the Dingle Peninsula Tourism Alliance, located on the southern coast of Ireland. Gary serves as chairperson of the alliance, and Caroline is a marketing consultant for DPTA. Gary grew up on the peninsula and now runs Greenmount House, a 4-star rated bed and breakfast in Dingle. Caroline visited…
Making Accessibility Second Nature, with Cory Lee
Cory Lee is a travel blogger and advocate accessibility to accommodate disabilities of all kinds. At a young age, Cory was diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy, but that certainly did not diminish his desire to travel. He has visited destinations on six of seven continents (Antarctica is still on the to-visit list!) Since starting his…
Doing Sports Travel Right, with Jay Smith
Jay has been in the travel industry since 1974, beginning his career operating camping programs for students throughout North America. Jay moved to Massachusetts in 1987 with his family and shortly after started up Sports Travel and Tours. The business first began with group trips primarily for baseball and expanded quickly to include most other…
The Travel Industry by the Numbers, with David Huether
David Huether currently serves as the Senior Vice President of Research at the U.S. Travel Association. In this role, David manages the association’s economic, tourism marketing and advocacy research programs. The U.S. Travel Association is a national non-profit travel advocacy organization working within all aspects of the travel and tourism industry, generating $2.4 trillion in…
Celebrating One Hundred Episodes, with Nicole Mahoney
Nicole Mahoney is the host for the Destination on the Left podcast. She is also the CEO of Break The Ice Media, the travel and tourism marketing agency she founded in 2009. Break The Ice Media specializes in working for clients in the travel and tourism industries, through the strategic use of public relations, social…
Keeping Things New But Timeless, with Justin Osbon
The travel industry is changing all the time. But some things are timeless. The challenge is to meet the evolving needs of clients, but retain all of the standards of good customer experience that are indeed timeless. On this episode of Destination on the Left, we talk with a true practitioner of this art. Justin…
Becoming a Destination United, with Adam Johnson
In a region with a lot of tourism opportunity, sibling rivalry is just part of the dynamic of working together. Even more so with metropolitan areas in close proximity: like the two Kansas Cities, or Dallas/Fort Worth, or my guest’s hometown of St. Paul and Minneapolis. On this episode of Destination on the Left, Adam…