Fort Smith A&P Director Timothy Jacobsen talks Netflix, tourism
Timothy Jacobsen had a hand in the place of Netflix’s strike series “Ozark. He is worked for accommodations and resorts in the Florida Keys and owned by Disney. And he has a keep track of file of small business recruitment and retention.
Now, Jacobsen has taken the helm of the Fort Smith Promotion and Advertising Fee, bringing with him 25 many years of expertise in place advertising. Just before coming to the town, he invested 15 a long time controlling Lake of the Ozarks Conference Center and Visitor Bureau, in which he increased inexpensive housing and introduced initiatives to create new amenities though helping the area get exposure by way of the strike streaming sequence.
Jacobsen delivers with him a holistic vision that harnesses Fort Smith’s latest venues, the possible for new venues, and Western heritage to improve tourism to the town.
A lot more neighborhood information:Will taxi fare restrictions be repealed in Fort Smith?
We sat down with Jacobsen on March 24 to examine how his hospitality experience suits into his new position in the River Valley, how what he acquired in the production of “Ozark” could transfer to Fort Smith and how he’d earn the public’s believe in to potentially establish a athletics complicated in the metropolis.
Explain to us a small about by yourself.
I’m at first from Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri, the place I expended 15 many years as the executive director of the Lake of the Ozarks Convention Visitor Bureau prior to coming below. Prior to that, I labored in the resort enterprise. I was basic manager of a residence at Lake of the Ozarks for a short period of time prior to taking a task with the convention visitor bureau. Prior to that, I was down in Florida, and I worked at a compact island vacation resort referred to as Cabbage Essential down there on the intercoastal waterway. Ahead of that, I worked with Disney, with their Great Neighbor inns down in Orlando. Prior to that, I was with Opryland in Nashville, Tennessee and Gaylord for entertainment for several a long time. Prior to that, I was with Hyatt Motels and traveled all more than the country doing the job in Louisville and a pair of various times in Dallas, diverse qualities.
Why did you want to be the Marketing and Promotion Commission Director of Fort Smith?
At this place in my job, I felt my ability established was correctly aligned with what the prerequisites ended up for this placement, and that I would be ready to come here and definitely be in a position to make a variation in the tourism field right here in Fort Smith.
Explain to us about your time at Lake of the Ozarks. What ended up some things you did there that you had been happy of?
We built a pretty solid staff there at that conference and customer bureau. We represented a three-county location with 19 different municipalities… We constructed a powerful workforce in reference to the (bureau), concentrated greatly on economic development. (I) was actually able to have a variance in putting together leadership on a regional foundation to seem at workforce and housing on an financial improvement side — you know, business enterprise recruitment, small business retention, and then also came incredibly shut to staying able to convey a multimillion-greenback sporting intricate to the spot. I was just happy to be part of a good group and a good crew that grew tourism exponentially for that location.
The Netflix sequence “Ozark” is established at Lake of the Ozarks.
Certainly, it is.
Did you have a hand in having the exhibit set there?
Definitely.
Inform us about that.
The clearly show “Ozark” was published by a gentleman by the title of Bill Dubuque out of St. Charles, Missouri. I labored outside the Missouri Film Fee with Bill Dubuque, Jason Bateman and a organization known as Capital Media Rights, and then two writers — Mark Williams and Chris Monday – to perform on receiving it funded by Netflix.
(I) experienced a hand in the area taking pictures that they did at Lake of the Ozarks, which they did — they did a whole lot of surface shooting, and I aided them choose out a pair of important spots and manage when they came to Lake of the Ozarks… Jason (Bateman) flew me down to Atlanta a couple of instances down there when they were filming. They did do most of the filming in Atlanta because of to the tax credits for the state of Georgia. We do not have tax credits in Missouri. We experimented with to get tax credits to consider to lobby for it, but we weren’t capable to. They produced quite a few excursions, in the beginning, seeking to get it funded, and then after they were being filming. So it was attention-grabbing to see how they’d choose a script that’s prepared by someone, and then the writers get alongside one another and rewrite the script. The conclusion result was fully distinctive from the original script. It was appealing performing with all those people men and women.
How would that practical experience transfer to Fort Smith?
In tourism, performing in movie, irrespective of wherever it is at, I assume there’s a whole lot of the exact same nuances you have to go by to do that. I have obtained some experience in accomplishing that with “Ozark” and would hope if there is at any time an possibility for someone to seem at Fort Smith, that I would be equipped to be associated with that and ideally be of the services they require to pull a little something like that off. Obviously, it’s fiction, so the stop final result is enjoyment. But it was an unbelievable quantity of publicity that it brought to our location there, and I assume that is any movie which is performed in any region — (it) can carry a large amount of exposure and awareness. So there’s all different sorts of techniques to endorse an space, and which is a single of them.
A single of your locations of knowledge is hospitality management. How does that advantage Fort Smith?
You’ve acquired to fully grasp what the neighborhood need is of your stakeholders in your area community, so understanding what not only just lodging amenities want but also what your regional group wants and has, and your property that you have as significantly as points of interest and restaurants and shopping and retail, I think that which is really worthwhile to have that knowledge. And then you have distinctive varieties of advertising in the hospitality business. You have unique journey, which is a completely unique concept than advertising and marketing, and then you have group and tour conference-kind journey. I imagine those people are two various kinds of promoting, two distinctive sorts of leadership, that you need with unique staff to be capable to carry out that. (We’re) privileged sufficient that Fort Smith has extremely viable staff in each of all those areas, in the team income side and the marketing side.
To be equipped to appear down in this article, the excellent issue about Fort Smith is it has a quite excellent really hard item. What I imply by that is the convention center and the resorts that assistance it. You have obtained to have a great, reliable, tricky products, but that is not why persons arrive. They arrive for an encounter, so if you have that tough product or service, you also have the vision of the men and women within just your group, the businesses, and the stakeholders. Then you can acquire a mission to shift ahead and attain factors. I assume Fort Smith has a fantastic quantity of Western-culture heritage, and then it also has a large amount of artwork and leisure sort of venues as nicely. So it is a excellent spherical of property to boost, and I’ve got a large amount of working experience in accomplishing all of that — I have a lot of expertise in the group gross sales aspect. I assume a single of the locations that we’ll see some advancement is bringing some bigger conventions into the convention center.
What are some spots you see some space for advancement in Fort Smith?
I imagine the conference centre is just one, and I consider the town has done a extremely great task with that, of looking outside and bringing in a professional business, OVG, that understands how to run a convention heart. Becoming able to have your very own in-property food items in a convention heart is enormous. Meeting planners don’t like to go to a destination the place they have to obtain a facility and have to purchase their caterers to do all their foods. So I assume that is a excellent chance that’s staying labored on correct now, and we’ll look at some other conventions that are coming.
We require to appear at a properly-rounded industry when it arrives to the group aspect. Bus excursions are huge, and the earlier workers at Fort Smith have done a terrific position of attracting bus tours to the location, and it will go on to be a main element of what we do. But I consider there’s also other markets in the religious current market, the sports activities market, the state association market, that we can set a little extra effort and hard work into to provide much more folks. So that’s an space that we will need to look at. You know, the notion of the Marshals Museum coming is a great new asset. I think I stated the concept of advertising not just the Western heritage and lifestyle, which is sturdy, but also the newer amusement and points of interest. I imagine that those people are all great factors of getting able to market the spot.
From your experience, do you have any new tips for Fort Smith that haven’t been completed still?
You know, I have quite a few points in my thought process. A good deal of matters have been tried in the past, but I believe 1 detail that I’m concentrating on ideal now is to continue to expand the markets and the tourism in the location, and that is likely to be some gradual advancement. But we have to look prolonged-expression at what kind of chances could be out there to give us a fantastic surge of new visitors – of anything in the variety of 25,000-30,000, or 40,000 new readers and area evenings coming into the industry. That’s acquired to be some sort of a driver, and it is acquired to be a driver that’s likely to complement the various property that you have, so I think there is a fantastic opportunity for some form of indoor, multipurpose recreational facility that could enable the convention middle.
Your convention center sizing is all about assembly, feeding, and breakout, or conference, feeding, and displays. Ideal now, you’d be pushing it to look at 500-700 individuals optimum for that. If you had a further facility to compliment what the conference heart has, this sort of as an indoor sports facility that had multipurpose – it could do basketball, volleyball, concert events, weddings, show booths, things of that kind – now, you could look at the probability of 1,000-1,200 people coming on peak night. Which is a good possibility since I believe that type of facility would enhance every little thing else that is in the downtown area. I assume you have already obtained the infrastructure listed here for dining establishments and points of interest and rooms, and I believe it would spherical off nicely with what’s below in the downtown space. In convert, it also has a wonderful area ingredient to it, for the area neighborhood to be ready to make the most of that sort of facility as nicely.
It just helps make a ton extra feeling for that variety of indoor facility, because it is 365 times a calendar year, as opposed to an outdoor facility, which I know some people today have seemed at in the earlier and talked about as properly. So I assume the 1st phase is because of diligence, and I’m approaching our A&P Fee and Arkansas Tourism about performing a feasibility study to see how we sit with that and what the options could be for us.
The city currently attempted to generate a sports sophisticated, and it fell as a result of.
It’s my comprehending it was an out of doors facility.
I wasn’t here through that time, but I’m of the mindset to go by way of thanks diligence. I consider you have to have to begin with a feasibility study… The scope of operate in a feasibility study is heading to glimpse at all the unique areas of what the various chances are, funding, location mechanisms. They’re going to communicate to all their local stakeholders, they are going to seem at what the demand from customers is in this region and this space, what the competitiveness would be, event operators. You are going to get a incredibly, pretty comprehensive report that suggests, ‘Here’s what the prospects could be,’ and then you’re going to will need to operationalize that study. If it demonstrates that there is beneficial prospect, then you’ll have to have to provide in some kind of owner/administration/developer to glance at moving it forward from there.
How would you go about getting general public belief right after the River Valley Sporting activities Sophisticated?
Yet again, I feel you begin by undertaking your owing diligence of producing the feasibility review and becoming pretty transparent about what it is. Component of doing the feasibility analyze is obtaining open community forums wherever persons can occur. You just have to do the greatest that you can about educating the general public on what you’re carrying out, and make positive you do your homework in performing it. Mainly because these amenities are traditionally loss leaders. They are not there to make money by themselves so a lot, but they’re there to have a substantial economic affect into the group.
I imagine you just have to have to be incredibly open up with the community. You will need to involve them and the stakeholders from the really commencing for some thing like this. It is not effortless – if it was quick, there would be persons who would have already performed it.
I can tell you, in the River Valley, there looks to be a void of this type of facility. I sure would like to see Fort Smith be at the forefront of hunting at this opportunity as opposed to some of our opponents that could even have far more of a wherewithal of funding to be equipped to do it. It is heading to be a challenge, and I’m keen to take that problem and shift forward – do the owing diligence that wants to be done to respond to all of these issues that someone in the neighborhood, any individual inside the town, anyone within just the sector, would request to make positive you’re generating the suitable selections. Occasionally you have to know when to stop, and you have to be open plenty of to say if we start out receiving data and it suggests this is not the proper form of opportunity for Fort Smith, then we would glance at concentrating on anything else.
But I have been performing this a whilst, and I assume that that sort of business – vacation sporting activities – is growing rapidly in our nation. I assume there is a good deal of chance with what Fort Smith has presently for this to enhance it. You just have to be, again, open to converse and be quite, quite transparent. If we do this research, my intention would be that each little bit of it would be public. I really don’t feel you can consider to continue to keep anything secretive, and I have satisfied with numerous individuals currently who are excited about that possibility. So we’ll see in which it goes.
Can you give any names of folks who are fired up about it?
That’s a superior concern – almost certainly wouldn’t be right at this point to do that. So yeah, I almost certainly need to have to maintain off on that one… If I was right here a small little bit extended and knew individuals personalities a small little bit superior, I would not have a difficulty.
Fort Smith has observed a force for features in the earlier couple of decades. Do you see on your own fitting into that press, and if so, how?
When you say features, what do you imply?
Areas like the Skate Park or the Bakery District, or enterprises like Bookish or Fort Smith Espresso Co.
I’m really a great deal in favor of expansion, and you have obtained to be cautious of not placing the cart before the horse right here. In buy for organizations to sustain that are right here – in buy to fill additional vacant options – you have to provide men and women. That’s where by I think we look at anything like the athletics intricate that brings, you know, up to 50,000 new guests to the area. That by itself will aid make it a lot more palatable for folks to glance at investing in some type of items in the spot, no matter whether it be restaurants or attractions. You just genuinely need to have to be able to provide the bodies to the spot for the complete economic components to operate.
Broadly speaking, what is your objective as the (Promoting and Promotion) Commission director of Fort Smith?
To keep on to grow tourism and people to the area. And performing with everyone below locally in Fort Smith, functioning with individuals on a statewide amount, and doing the job with some of the other locations. There’s some regionalism that can be done that we could be element of with other locations. For an case in point, you could have a bus tour that might go to Crystal Bridges, it could go to some other desired destination in conjunction with coming to Fort Smith. I believe that sales opportunities for a much better expertise for the customer as very well, so I consider that, once again, the vision of the stakeholders and the local community is quite potent listed here, and they want to see matters increase. We want to be capable to do the points that want to transpire to be ready to do that.
We have some extremely wise people who do the job within the conference visitor bureau currently. We’re doing the job on producing a shopper relation management (CRM), in which we’ll be in a position to be much more strategic and have metrics and measurements of the promotion that we do to know what is doing the job and to know how to shift it to get the most economic affect in every way we can out of each individual dollar that we commit. I imagine that by yourself suitable there is seeking to be as efficient and productive as you can in the dollars that you invest to convey persons to the region.
