Paul Szmal: And FLX Morning continues, it is 8.38, and I'm joined by Jeff Shipley, the President and CEO of Discover Seneca, Seneca County Chamber. Jeff, good morning.
Jeff Shipley: Good morning, Paul. Happy Earth Day to you, sir.
Paul Szmal: Same to you. We've got quite a lot going on in the area, and I always like to spotlight these, as I think I mentioned previously, because if you've got points on your license, this is a good way to erase some of them, and talking about the driver safety course scheduled for Saturday.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, you know, we're one of the few places that I am aware of that offers an in-person class setting for this program, and you know, a lot of people take it online these days, but a lot of people just find that it's more convenient to go in person, and so the Seneca County Chamber of Commerce offers this six-hour defensive driver's safety discount program. The next one coming up is Saturday, this Saturday, from 9 to 3. We still do have, I think we have two spaces left, so if anyone is interested, this would be a good time to give our office a call at the chamber, 568-2906, sign up for that class. So yeah, it's a really great opportunity, Paul, in person, knocks a couple points off your license, and it allows you to get an insurance discount on your auto insurance, so it's a very worthwhile program, and I think benefit for our community.
Paul Szmal: Absolutely, and backing up a couple of days, the next Chamber University is coming up on Thursday. What's on the docket for this one?
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, this is going to be our friends from CFCU Credit Union are going to do a session about making money simple, and so these are some very good practical tips that either someone just as an individual or even a small business owner can come and learn more about the things that you would typically do at a bank, how to get insurance or how to get loans and how to manage your credit, basically, and I think there's some real practical tips for everyone to be learned. This is going to be a virtual session, so there is no charge for this, but you do have to sign up, and you sign up at the Seneca County Chamber of Commerce, you can call that office or you can go online, but it's going to be this Thursday from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. Again, who doesn't want to have money made simple these days, and you're going to get a lot of practical advice and tips from the experts.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, and you know that basic knowledge refresher is never a bad thing.
Jeff Shipley: Absolutely, that's certainly a benefit from having an organization like the Chamber of Commerce where we can draw from a lot of different experts in the fields, and it kind of demystifies it but it also does it in a way that's kind of non-threatening and sort of neighborly advice, and I think it's a really worthwhile session for people to tune in.
Paul Szmal: And there's an anniversary that we're going to be marking on May the 1st.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, we cannot wait for this one. 130 years in the making, Paul, but it's the anniversary of the opening of the Smith Opera House in Geneva, and this one's going to be special. That's why I wanted to highlight it here on today's segment, because it's not only the Seneca County Chamber of Commerce, but it's the FLX Chamber and it's the Ontario County Chamber, all coming together to help celebrate and honor the wonderful legacy that is the Smith Opera House. It's going to be on May 1st from 4 to 6 p.m. at the Smith Opera House in Geneva, and you know, I mean, we talk a lot about economic development, certainly in our circles and in our segment, Paul, but there is something to be said for the impact that the arts community has on downtown. Certainly anyone in Geneva knows this, but also just the revitalization of neighborhoods, you know, and if you're going out to a play, it means you're probably going to go grab a bite to eat across the street or next door. It means you're going to experience more things to do and see in the area, and more importantly, contribute economic development dollars into that, an infusion into that economy. So we are so proud of what the Smith Opera House has meant to both Geneva and the surrounding communities, and we can't wait to come together to celebrate that 130th anniversary of the Smith Opera House.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, certainly some iconic shows and performances there over the years, and I've witnessed firsthand the redevelopment of the area around the Smith with the new restaurants and establishments that have opened in the 12 years that I've been here.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, you know, again, it kind of goes back to what I said, people take for granted the catalyst that an arts organization like the Smith does for economic development in downtown. It's certainly an integral part of the downtown Geneva mix, and it is all across the country. So yeah, it's going to be a fun time. I know I've watched a handful of shows that I can't even remember, but they are so good, and it's just such a great venue to do so, and we're so lucky to have it in our community.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, I'm going to insert a cheap self-promotional plug in here for our show that we're doing with the Smith, featuring Tusk on Thursday, June the 5th. Tickets are available for that, by the way, at thesmith.org. End of shameless self-promotion. Okay, let's move on. We're talking with Jeff Shipley from the Seneca County Chamber here on FLX Morning. You've launched a brand new chamber discount program. Tell me about it.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, we're so excited to be able to launch new programs, and so many of our programs come right from our membership, ways that we can spur partnerships, strategic relationships between the two, or quite frankly, just business between members. And so we've launched a membership discount program. It lives on your phone, on your cell phone, so it's basically like an app. And there's any number of retailers, organizations, businesses that have offered some sort of a discount for the Chamber of Commerce membership network. And you can find all of these on the senecachamber.org website. We're so happy to have such a strong, supportive community, but it's a great way to do business, to spur business between members. Who knows? Find that maybe strategic partnership that you've been missing and can really help grow your business even more. So it's a great way to kind of spur development, and we're excited to watch it grow. And again, these are all discounts meant to be used by members when they go to visit other member businesses and do business with other members. And there's ranges from, you know, restaurant discounts and deals to, I saw one for IT solutions, you know, help with a sort of like a wellness check for your computer system. There's all sorts of creative things that our members have partnered. So it's a great benefit, Paul, of Chamber of Commerce membership.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, it almost sounds like a cross between a virtual coupon book and a rewards club.
Jeff Shipley: Absolutely. That's a great way to put it. I think I'm going to steal that, Paul. That's a great way to summarize what this program is all about. And there is a brand new tourism tear-off map that is now available. How long has that been in the works?
Paul Szmal: So this has been in the works for probably since December or January timeframe. So we've been working on it for quite a few months now, and we are, you know, I'm constantly amazed at, you know, we live in a digital world for sure, Paul. I don't think there's any doubting that. But I go all over, and a couple of weeks ago I was in D.C. representing the Finger Lakes region in a travel and tourism show, and people still want maps, printed maps. They still want to hold something in their hands. They want to use that as a visual tool to plan their trip and see how they fit into this bigger region. And so we've come out with a really neat tear-off map. It's really meant to help aid some of our frontline staffs. So think of hotel people at the front desk of a hotel or at a winery when you're in checking out with your purchases of wine, or really anywhere else that a visitor would gather, would come together to help spur travel within the area and kind of give somebody a takeaway to leave in their cars, kind of get them excited and influenced for other great things to be done on their visit.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, there's something about a printed map. It's almost like, because it's a tangible object, it has something that Google Maps and Yelp reviews don't always have.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, absolutely. I can't even tell you how many times the folks came over to our booth in D.C. and wanted to take away a map, and I said, oh, I don't have one for you, but we will bring one back next time we come. And it really is something, as you said, tangible that people can take, and I think it really makes an impact on their visit and certainly leaves a great impression, and maybe even a little keepsake to take with them from their travel.
Paul Szmal: Well, let's step back into the digital world for a second here, because you've done a collaboration on a video with folks that I love in New York.
Jeff Shipley: First time we've done this collaboration with the State Tourism Office, and it was such a big hit. So the premise here, Paul, is if you had 48 hours to spend in Seneca Falls, how would you do so? And so working with our team at the Seneca County Tourism Office, we went around to some of our maybe more popular tourism destinations and some that, quite frankly, were kind of off the beaten path. And we took little video clips that were then sent to the State Tourism Office. They sort of compiled them in a manner that has been pretty creative, put it on a reel, on an Instagram reel, and shared it out. And it has been one of our more viral videos that we've done this year. We are so excited to do more of those types of collaborations with the state, with our region now. We have a great blueprint. And our team, our creative team, led by Samantha Maslin back at the office, is so talented at putting things like that together. But it just gives you a sign of the times where people want to sort of see it all together, see a little mini clip, a movie clip, if you will. They want to experience that. It's set to music. You know, it's just kind of like a hip and new age way of delivering our tourism message, but really worked out very well. I would encourage people to go onto our social media. You can find us at Discover Seneca on Facebook and Instagram and pull this up. It was a lot of fun working on it.
Paul Szmal: What a great collaboration and way to spur traffic visitation to the Seneca Falls community. And before we wrap up, I want to give a shout out for the new events calendar that's available.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, this is something that has really taken off. We have what I believe to be the most comprehensive calendar of events in our community, in our area. And that lives on our website. It's shared on our social media. But something we've started doing over the last few weeks has been, now that the weather is turning and it's starting to become definitely spring-like in there somewhere, but summer is around the corner, we've started putting out weekly PDFs. They're like a PDF that we share through social media of all the events or some of the top events to check out, things to see and do on the upcoming weekend. And it has been received very favorably. I think it is definitely helping spur visitation to places that some might not have even knew was going on in their backyard. And it's been one of our more popular downloads. So I would encourage people to go to Discover Seneca and check out the calendar of events, the weekend updates. It's a really great tool to help deliver the message of what's there to do this weekend, what's there to see this weekend. Usually that's the first thing that they always ask me whenever they see me.
Paul Szmal: Well, as always, Jeff, pleasure to have you on and thanks for the information. Much appreciated, sir.
Jeff Shipley: Yeah, thank you, Paul.
Paul Szmal: All right. That's Jeff Shipley from Discover Seneca and the Seneca County Chamber joining us on FLX Morning. It's 852.
