Chamber asks for $18,000 to help promote Princeton

PRINCETON — The city of Princeton is continuing its tourism outreach into a multi-state region.

Princeton Chamber of Commerce Director Erika Robbins made a presentation at the Nov. 16 meeting of the Princeton City Council, requesting $18,000 in tourism dollars to place an ad in the 2010 Illinois Summer Guide through the Peoria Area Convention and Visitors Bureau. The summer newspaper insert, published in April, is distributed to 1.2 million households. The funds will also provide the city with a link on vacationfun.com where the city has its electronic visitor guide posted, Robbins said.

Target markets for the summer insert include places like Chicago, St. Louis and the Quad Cities, as well as cities in Kentucky, Indiana, Wisconsin and Michigan.

As the result of the 2009 insert, Princeton received 6,353 requests for tourism information, Robbins said. The city responded to 3,055 of those requests by mail and the remaining 3,298 electronically. The city has placed the ad in the summer insert for the past two years, Robbins said.

After Robbins’ presentation, Princeton City Manager Jeff Fiegenschuh recommended the city go ahead and approve the request for the 2010 fiscal year budget.

“I think we are making great strides with tourism,” Fiegenschuh said. “That’s one of the areas where we are actually seeing more people in the community and seeing our hotel/motel tax going up.”

Since the request was for the city’s 2010 fiscal budget, no action was taken on the request at Monday’s meeting.

In other tourism news, Robbins said the city has received a $25,659 matching grant for marketing projects for the 2009-10 year. The money will be spent on things like billboards, Web site development, brochures, mailing costs, and newspaper, radio and cable advertisements. Some of the projects are new, while others are repeat projects.

The Princeton Chamber and Tourism groups are also working together to host a three-day regional tourism expo, hopefully in early 2010, Robbins said. The outreach will be through a 50-mile radius of Princeton. The expo committee is being assembled and will meet in the near future.

Following Robbins’ presentation, the city council commended the tourism committee on its work to promote Princeton as a tourist destination.