Grey County Tourism Excels at EDCO Winning Two Awards

Toronto, Ontario – Grey County was recognized for tourism excellence on February 9 at the 60^th annual Economic Developers Council of Ontario (EDCO) conference in downtown Toronto. The County received two awards Thursday evening. The County’s Destination Development Action Plan won the Planning & Building Initiatives Award for regions with a population 50,000 – 250,000. The County also accepted the Promotional Award for Advertising for its marketing efforts for the #ColourItYourWay 2016 Fall Campaign.

“We’re very proud to be recognized for the work we are doing to attract more visitors to Grey County and increase sustainable tourism for our local industry,” said Grey County Warden Alan Barfoot. “It will be exciting to see the plan to continue to unfold over the next few years.”

Bannikin Travel & Tourism developed the Destination Development Action Plan with guidance from Grey County staff, members of the Tourism Advisory Committee and Regional Tourism Organization 7. This plan focuses on four key pillars: community engagement, destination management, market research and tracking, and resource allocation.

“We had excellent feedback from our industry partners and that really helped bring the Action Plan together,” said Gary Gingras, Chair of the Tourism Advisory Committee. “Now the County is walking the talk by providing regular workshops, familiarization tours and networking events. Enhanced collaboration and improved data are crucial.”

The County also took home the Promotional Award for Advertising for the #ColourItYourWay 2016 Fall Campaign. The campaign generated more than 3.8 million impressions on Facebook driving 66,000 visitors to Grey County’s tourism website www.VisitGrey.ca and increasing the County’s Facebook following by 50%. Media Tours also lead to articles in prominent national news and travel outlets including the National Post. Overall, Grey County tourism businesses had a strong fall season and the fall campaign exceeded goals of increasing visitation and sales.

About the Destination Development Action Plan

In late 2015, Grey County, in partnership with Regional Tourism Organization 7, hired Bannikin Travel & Tourism to update Grey’s original Tourism Destination Develop­ment Action Plan. The goal was to create a new plan to guide Grey County’s tourism staff to continue increasing sustainable tourism revenues. Supporting economic development and growth is a high priority for Grey County. The County completed its first economic development strategy called “Made in Grey” in early 2015. Updating the Tourism action plan was a key action.

More details are available on VisitGrey.ca. 

About EDCO

EDCO is an independent and non-profit association of persons engaged in the economic development of Ontario and its municipalities. The Council of formed in 1957 and was incorporated in 1962 as the Ontario Industrial Developers Council Inc. In 1991, the Council changed its name to reflect the broadened and changing nature of the Ontario economy. Today’s membership embraces a broad spectrum of economic development practitioners across a variety of professions and at all levels of public and private sectors ... each adding specialized knowledge to the existing and ever-expanding resources of EDCO.

Visit www.edcoconference.com to learn more about the 2016 conference.

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For more information contact Rob Hatten, Communications Manager, at robert.hatten [at] grey.ca (robert[dot]hatten[at]grey[dot]ca) or 519-372-0219 ext. 1235.