鈥淛asper is a community first and destination second.鈥�
That鈥檚 what makes it so special, said Jorg Michel, who was among 20 community members, business owners and tour operators who attended Tourism Jasper鈥檚 final branding workshop last week.
The two workshops, May 8 and 9, attracted about 50 participants, who took part in exercises to determine what makes Jasper unique.
For Michel, who is originally from Germany, Jasper鈥檚 allure is a feeling of authenticity.
鈥淵ou can be who you are when you get here.
鈥淲hen you鈥檙e working in the big cities, you have all those constraints on your life, but when you get here you can unfold, you can feel the freedom and you can be true to yourself.鈥�
For the past 12 years, Jasper has been luring tourists to town with the tagline: 鈥淛asper. Wonderful. By Nature.鈥� Tourism Jasper鈥攖he town鈥檚 destination marketing organization鈥攊s looking to revamp that tagline with something fresh and enticing.
So it has hired Stormy Lake Consulting and Copithorne and Blakely鈥攖he two consulting company鈥檚 that created Travel Alberta鈥檚 鈥淩emember to Breathe鈥� campaign鈥攖o work their magic.
鈥淲e have a brand and what we鈥檙e here for today is to dive a little bit deeper,鈥� said Mary Darling, CEO of Tourism Jasper, May 9. 鈥淲hat we need is our visitors鈥� opinion and we also need our residents鈥� opinion, all of this together is going to give us a very defined and different story so that we can go out there and celebrate and bring the world to Jasper.鈥�
The community workshops were just one step in a process of collecting information about what Jasperites and tourists think of the town.
The consultants have also been speaking with visitors at various attractions throughout the park, to find out what it is that drew them to this place and what it is that they felt while they were here.
鈥淭here鈥檚 really cool stuff that comes out of talking with the visitors,鈥� said Philip Coppard of Stormy Lake Consulting. 鈥淸For example,] we met a couple on the SkyTram and the wife was like 鈥榠t is so, so magical鈥� and her husband says, 鈥榶eah, you go 100 kilometres and you鈥檙e 400 photos deep.鈥�
鈥淲hat an interesting way to describe the documentation. It鈥檚 so much more vivid. There鈥檚 so much more power in that than 鈥榯here鈥檚 27,000 mountains.鈥欌��
Those anecdotes are helpful in working toward a new brand for Jasper, said Coppard, who noted that Jasper has to find a way to differentiate itself.
鈥淲e have to be different from other places to go, so the international traveller wants to do both and the regional traveller wants to do you instead of the other thing. So we really need to understand what that unique element is.鈥�
Coppard said when people travel, they care more about the feeling they get in a place than about the things that exist there. So, during the workshop, participants were asked to list some of their favourite activities in the park and the way those activities make them feel.
Following the prompt, Trina Mickelsen said she feels a sense of bliss when she skis down from the top of Marmot Basin as fast as she can; Nicole Gaboury said she feels a sense of awe and wonder when she sees double rainbows over Athabasca Island; and Michel said, while napping with the caribou in the Tonquin Valley, he feels special.
According to Coppard, it鈥檚 not everyday that he and his colleagues get to work in a community whose residents are as connected as they are here in Jasper.
鈥淲e鈥檝e been in other places where there鈥檚 a big, big disconnect between the community and tourism, and here is different and that is a really useful thing鈥攖o get that understanding and then start to compare it to the visitor experience and the visitor expectation.鈥�
Stormy Lake Consulting will begin making those comparisons shortly and will then hand over its research to Copithorne and Blakely, who will come up with a marketing strategy and a new tagline for the town.
鈥淭hen the last component is that we鈥檒l come back and run some workshops with the community on how you can use this brand to help your business, because we have a point of view that brands need to serve the industry, not tell the industry how to act.
鈥淪o the brand doesn鈥檛 legislate what you do, it serves you and your needs of what you want to try to accommodate as a business.鈥�
Nicole Veerman
[email protected]
