Marketing Maine | The new head of the state's Office of Tourism tries to enhance Maine's stickiness
Photo/Amber Waterman
Carolann Ouellette, the new director of the Maine Office of Tourism
Carolann Ouellette, the deputy director of the Maine Office of Tourism in the Department of Economic and Community Development, recently stepped up to the top job, replacing Pat Eltman. She spent 10 years running her own restaurant, Moose Point Tavern in Jackman, and earlier worked at such well-known destinations as Attean Lake Lodge and the Sugarloaf Inn, and for white water rafting companies. After graduating from the Cornell School of Hotel Administration, she returned to Maine “as soon as I could figure out a way to place myself here,” she says. Mainebiz recently sat down with her to discuss her views on making the state more attractive to visitors. An edited transcript follows.
Mainebiz: You’ve had four years at the Office of Tourism and now are directing the operation. What do you see as the role of the Office of Tourism in this large and diverse industry?
Ouellette: As simplified as it may seem, our role is to put together a program, a strategy, a promotional program to attract visitors from out of state into Maine. Secondarily, we need to make sure that people coming into the state move around the state. Trying to get some geographic distribution, and also seasonal distribution, even though we know summertime is our strong period. But certainly that doesn’t discount the day trips and also making sure Mainers have an appreciation for things they can do as well.
Do we have any idea of how much tourism revenue comes from Mainers?
In terms of day trips, 37% of them are from Mainers. For overnight stays, it’s just 6%.
You might think that some people moving to Maine now — pre-retirees and retirees — are doing more tourism-like activities than people who work 40 hours a week.
If I’m not mistaken, the percentages have remained fairly steady, but I don’t know whether the dollar amounts have, too.
We’ve entered what is by many accounts a business-friendly administration. Does that change your office’s focus?
The mission doesn’t change. The primary focus is to make sure Maine is in front of our regional market and, more broadly, our national and worldwide market, and that we’re continuing to put the message out there of all Maine has to offer as a vacation destination. And we’re really trying to make it that world-class destination.
How about funding? We’ve heard that Maine does not spend as much as — pick your favorite state, Maryland, or some state heavily promoting itself. Could we do more if we had more money?
You can always do more with more money. But in many respects we’re lucky because we have a legislatively designated special revenue fund. It helps you plan. And we’ve actually gone from a lower ranking to a higher ranking, in the thirties to low twenties [of the 50 states’ tourism spending]. Nationally, we’re going from big budgets to potentially nothing, as we saw in Connecticut and Washington state. We’ve watched neighboring states’ budgets decrease because there’s not a specific funding formula. So I do feel we’re fortunate.
Your funding is basically a percentage of the 7% rooms and meals tax?
Right. Of the total, 5% comes to us, and 95% goes to the General Fund.
Sort of revenue sharing for tourism.
I guess so. For the last couple of years, it’s been right around the $9 million mark [for the biennium.]
One thing quite striking earlier in this legislative session was the billboard legislation. Some businesses were promoting this as a means to reach more people through outdoor advertising, while the tourism industry seemed to be unhappy about the idea of billboards coming back. Could you talk a little bit about it from the tourism perspective?
We know that visitors value, and see as a great asset, Maine’s scenic beauty. It’s prevalent through all our research. From an attraction standpoint, that holds much more value than a larger sign on the side of the road. And there’s so many ways now to get the message out to the people you’re trying to attract.
That came through as a theme of the hearing, that you can get more information from your iPhone than you can …
Exactly. Than you can from a billboard.
Many remember the signs for businesses of years past, such as the one on Route 1 in Belfast for Perry’s Nut House. But it’s not tempting enough for people to think it might be a good idea again?
No. I talked to a lot of the different industry representatives, who all said scenic values are so important to maintain that you should focus there rather than on increasing the number or size of signs.
In the relatively recent past, there’ve been attempts to put a coal-fired power plant in Bucksport that would have had a direct impact on Acadia National Park. I’m curious how you deal with those questions of economic development and job creation versus preserving the status quo for the sake of tourism.
That’s an interesting question but not one, honestly, we directly deal with. We’re really marketers rather than business attraction folks.
So it’s not in your job description. But you must hear this anyway.
You do, and my sense of it is that it really comes down more to the municipality, the area in which these things are being considered, and what long term is probably best for them. We don’t get involved as often. It’s really just, “What’s the message? And how do we get ’em in?”
There’s a lot of talk about the Maine brand, and everybody has a slightly different take. For some people it’s L.L.Bean; for other people, it’s being way out in the woods. What do you tell people about this Maine brand, say when you’re at a convention?
We’re headed to one here next week... And it’s funny, in coming up with the tagline for “There’s More to Maine,” that was meant to show there’s kind of a broad appeal, but when people talk about Maine, and when we talk about Maine, it’s the mix of natural beauty and the authenticity of it. It’s a place to rest, relax, unwind, rewind. We’ve got landscapes and dramatic scenery, no doubt about it. It’s a natural place. It’s a safe place. All those words come into play. But there’s some things people don’t expect. Particularly the arts communities, the Maine-made piece, the local food producers — there’s all these special pieces that make up part of the whole. The outdoor sporting heritage, but you’ve also got maritime heritage, fishing heritage — lobsters and lighthouses really are big.
The studies I’ve seen suggest that most of the dollars are still spent within a few miles of the coast. But clearly there’s also interest in that huge area up there, that blank spot on the map, as some people call it, where there are no roads and no towns. Then there’s the idea of a new national park. Some people would like to see a Maine Woods National Park. Do you get involved in that discussion?
We watch to kind of see where things are going, but we haven’t been involved directly yet. Certainly, how does it fit in? Is it a good idea? It’s still very much in the early discussion stages, and goes back to the question about which industry comes in where. That is going to come down to the people that are around those regions to interact and discuss it.
It’s interesting how Greenville and Millinocket have diverged. In Greenville, the Plum Creek proposal is one vision of a tourism future based on resorts, privately run. Millinocket might be closer to a national park … more oriented toward existing wilderness values. Is there room for both?
I probably can’t answer that, to tell the truth. I wish I could. If I knew the answer, we’d probably be further along, but it would take more than just making a guess, and really looking at feasibility. What does it take to maintain something like that? We do know, obviously, that Acadia is a gem. It’s part of Maine’s brand, actually, as much as L.L.Bean. But, it’s going to take some time to figure out how all this intersects with the federal government and the National Park Service, and how those two connect.
Both visions are long term. But I assume you do look at what Maine might be like in the future?
One thing that comes into play is that balance of, “If you build it, will they come?” We focus on trying to work with existing operators, trying to get their marketing efforts in tune with ours. I watch what the Appalachian Mountain Club has been able to do, and the Maine Huts and Trails system. If you look at the expansion at Saddleback, and the expansion the New England Outdoor Center is proposing, we try to work with the folks on the ground. They’re working on a Maine Woods Discovery piece, and putting together packages, marketing collaboratively. We try to help.
Is there something you would like to see happen over the next few years to cement this relationship between Maine and its visitors?
There’s all kinds of things going through my head. One of the things we’ve talked about is this broad “There’s More to Maine” — the parts and pieces people don’t necessarily think about. The perception gap is that Maine’s nice, it’s pretty, it’s a little far away, and there’s not much to do. So a lot of marketing strategy has been geared to get those folks to think, “It’s not just Baxter State Park and a beautiful rocky coastline.” But one thing we’d like to see is for visitors to get into those outer reaches. The national trend is multi-generational trips, families having quality time together. One of our goals is attracting more of those visitors, and getting them further afield. We do know that once people get to Maine, they absolutely love it. All our research shows that if you can get ’em here, they’re coming back. And it might just be that outdoor heritage — that connection to place, that will help us achieve that.
Douglas Rooks, a writer based in West Gardiner, can be reached at editorial@mainebiz.biz.
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