Paul Szmal: And welcome back to FLX Morning, it is 8.39, we continue on Travel and Tourism Tuesday here, try saying that three times fast by the way, with Jeff Shipley from Discover Seneca on the line with us, hey Jeff how are you?
Jeff Shipley: Well good morning Paul, you know hearing Greg's news rundown today, every time I hear about Memorial Day and the Lake Trout Derby, it's always for me the unofficial start of summer.
Paul Szmal: Ah yeah. They're great. Yeah absolutely, and with that some summertime activities and some business to tend to, we'll get to that in a minute, but first the safe driving course being offered again tomorrow and Wednesday.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah this one's the two-day course so it's three hours each night, a very popular course it has been over the last couple of months, we are pretty full on this course but we could probably squeeze some room for an additional person or two. Always a popular option, you get some points knocked off your driver's license and you save up to 10% on your car insurance over the next couple of years, so it's a great way to go into summer driving season with a fresh record.
Paul Szmal: Yeah if somebody wanted to grab one of the open slots, how do they do that Jeff?
Jeff Shipley: Give the Chamber Office a call, it's probably your best bet, it's 568-2906 and Pat in the Chamber Office can sign you up.
Paul Szmal: Alright, fantastic. Now let's move on, talking about the business end of things, the Chamber has business to attend to and the annual legislative luncheon is coming up on June 3rd.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah our three state legislators are always so generous with us with their time, Senator Tom O'Mara, Assemblyman Jeff Gallagher and Assemblyman Phil Palmisano will all be on hand, this is going to be next Tuesday, June 3rd at Del Lago Resort and Casino and it's our annual legislative luncheon so it's an opportunity for us to actually one, take a look at what happened in the busy New York State budget season, what passed in the budget, what implications that may have on the business community but also to look ahead, there is still one last bit of legislative session to go here in June, it's always typically around this time frame so they are really able to help give our community, our business community a better idea of what's being discussed and not everything that happens in this legislative cycle goes into effect with law but it does give you a good precursor for what's on the potential horizon for the following year so it's a really great session certainly for the business community but also just general public if you're interested in what's happening at the state level when it comes to budget, when it comes to policy decisions, this is a really good event to attend and learn all of that.
Paul Szmal: And where is that happening again?
Jeff Shipley: So we're going to be next Tuesday, June 3rd from 1230 to 130 at Del Lago Resort and Casino, tickets are available, you could just show up and pay at the door but tickets are available ahead of time as well, we have a big crowd and we have a really great forum to discuss all things state government.
Paul Szmal: Jeff Shipley from Discover Seneca joining us here on FLX Morning, the next Business After Hours is going to be at a pretty unique location.
Jeff Shipley: It is for us, so you know how this program works, every month we pick a different member of our Chamber of Commerce and we visit there, we bring a collection of people there to really learn more about that business, a lot of times it's at a winery or a brewery or a lodging facility, this time coming up in June, on June 18th we are going to be at the Finger Lakes Regional Airport and that facility has had such an investment in it over the last, oh I would say decade plus and it's a really great opportunity especially for the people in and around the Seneca Falls area, the Seneca County community to see what the economic development of that facility is, it's a really incredible asset that we have in this community, there's businesses that have propped up whether it's the Finger Lakes Wing and Rotor, the Finger Lakes Helicopter business, there are a number of businesses that have propped up because of that facility, it means so much to the local area for economic development and you know as business leaders are able to fly in and fly out rather conveniently, the one thing that that airport is looking for is a runway growth, just a few hundred feet is really what's going to make all the difference to help land some of the more bigger private jets there and so we really want to give people an opportunity, A, what it's all about and B, just kind of open their eyes a little bit more about some of the economic development that is able to have happen here in this area because of that facility.
Paul Szmal: And again that is coming up on June the 18th and you can contact the Chamber Office for more info on that.
Jeff Shipley: Sure can, love to and you don't have to be a member of the Chamber of Commerce to attend that, the public is very welcome at that event and should be a really great time to interact and see what that facility is all about.
Paul Szmal: I know you've been working hard on the member discount program and it looks like we're about ready to have the official launch.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, we're going to launch that in June, over 35 member discounts and deals to be had throughout the greater Seneca County Chamber community, so if you're a member of the Chamber certainly give our office a call, look into that because it's a great way to do business locally and save a few dollars on the side, so who doesn't want that? So we are really excited to launch this program, we're launching it, well like I said just over 35 discounts and deals but hopefully that will continue to grow and grow and it's really I think one of the more important messages that our Chamber or any Chamber has is to do business local and this is a great way to encourage that.
Paul Szmal: Absolutely and you have a Chamber field trip coming up to one of our great advertising partners.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, so Paul now I may be dating myself here but when I was back in my school days especially my elementary school days, I remember some of the more favorite parts of my year and day were when we got out of the classroom and went on a little field trip and we'd go to the library or we'd go to a museum and it was it was such a great experience to a get out of your normal mundane maybe routine but also learn something in a very real way and we're bringing that concept back to the Chamber of Commerce. They're called the First Friday Program, so the first Friday of every month our Chamber rounds together a group of people interested in going on a field trip with us. We go to that particular business, spend some time with the ownership or the management team learning about it, learning how they work in our community, maybe take some some notes on some of their best practices if you will and just overall learning more about the business and we're doing that coming up here on the first Friday of June at LC New York which is a really neat business model for those that are not aware they're in Seneca Falls but it's just a great program that I think gets some people in our community out and really in a fun way maybe learning about the businesses that contribute to our economic activity.
Paul Szmal: All right I'm going to have you put your tourism hat on for a second here Jeff, we're going to talk about the visitor guide and maps that are now on display throughout the community.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah I think we've talked about this a lot Paul but it's finally out right where we finally launched our visitor guide and it's a tablet tear-off map so it's really meant to aid visitors as in the front line staff of our tourism industry to help navigate people around our community, maybe bring highlight where some of the spots that they're interested in going are, give them a general snapshot of our community and it's been met with a lot of success already. I think we've already on our second and third supplies for most of the local businesses so that has really been met with great fanfare and then our visitor guide is an annual publication that we come out with that's really more of a magazine style approach that helps people understand maybe gives them some of the story content more about some of our local businesses and some of our local tourism assets in a way that they can they can really sink their teeth into and really feel like they know what's going on with that business before they even set foot there. So both of those publications are out we're really happy to say that and you know our goal every year is is before the Memorial Day holiday to get all of those types of programming in place and let us get on with a busy busy summer activity of welcoming visitors here.
Paul Szmal: Now this next one piqued my interest when I saw it you're working on a special haunted history guide.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah this one is fun this my wife and I like to go on ghost tours when we go to new cities we've done Savannah and New Orleans and and the like and you know it's really been an eye-opening experience doing that because there are so many people out there that a sort of want that ghost experience but also want to learn the history about a community and there are a lot of people that come through New York State and participate in the haunted history trail of New York State. Seneca County has one property that's on the statewide trail and so this was a way for us to boost our exposure and boost our assets that are on that trail so when people come to Seneca County they don't just have one property to go to they have multiple and they can spend a little bit more time here really get to know the area and so we have been working this past few off season this past few months on putting together a host of area places to go that have some sort of ghostly past but also help tell the story of Seneca County. So we have five or six different properties in in and around the community that we are putting together in like a brochure a walking type map and an app on your phone and on the internet that help tell this story. So we have the Becker House in Seneca Falls we have the Gould Hotel in Seneca Falls we have the Waterloo Memorial Day National Memorial Day Museum for example and many other properties as well but it's just a great opportunity to appeal to people not just on Halloween but also throughout the year but also help tell the story of what we have in this very very historic community of ours.
Paul Szmal: And finally we want to wrap up with the Regional Outdoor Experience Marketing Campaign.
Jeff Shipley: So we are finally ready to launch this program it's been a year in the making we have six amazing videos that tell the story of outdoor experiences in the Finger Lakes how to experience them also promoting the sustainability and the accessibility aspect of our outdoor experience throughout the region and so we are now ready to launch that we're launching the campaign actually at the end of June at the Welcome Center in Geneva. All of the different counties from the Finger Lakes will be on hand along with the filmmakers along with some of our champions that help tell our story and what we're going to do is start to bring these videos to life market them to a far and wide audience here and around the northeast and particularly those that are interested in outdoors experiences and you know we're going to be showing them on everything from connected tv you know think of Roku and Hulu when you when you go to watch one of your shows that this video ad will pop up so we're really excited about launching this campaign and and really bringing the message of accessibility and sustainability and what the Finger Lakes Outdoors is.
Paul Szmal: All right as always appreciate the info Jeff thank you sir.
Jeff Shipley: Thank you Paul.
Paul Szmal: All right it is 8 52 on FLX morning.
