Maryland Business

By: Liz Farmer

I can’t remember all the times I’ve heard the phrase “do more with less” this year…it has officially been filed under my list of Overused Phrases of 2009. But every once and a while the notion actually works.

This spring, four Baltimore tourism entities announced they were pooling their resources (namely, money) to market the Inner Harbor this summer in a $400,000 campaign called Waterfront Invasion. The Maryland Science Center and the National Aquarium in Baltimore teamed up with Visit Baltimore and the Waterfront Partnership to promote the waterfront, the aquarium’s “Jellies Invasion: Oceans Out of Balance” exhibit and the Science Center’s “Chinasaurs: Dinosaur Dynasty” in a media blitz that hit TV, radio, newspapers and billboards in Washington, Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania.

It was the first time such a collaboration had been attempted for downtown Baltimore tourism.

The result? Attendance numbers at the Science Center and aquarium surpassed projections and hotels benefited from the travel packages. Specifically,
• The ticket upgrade sales for Chinasaurs doubled projected numbers.
• Summer attendance at the aquarium was 13 percent above projections.
• More than 874 room nights booked through Waterfront Invasion packages.
• Waterfront Invasion media coverage reached 23,385,771 people and generated $648,911 in advertising equivalency.

The industry has noticed: the campaign won the Maryland Tourism Council’s Industry Partnership Award at their summit last week and last month it won an Award of Distinction from the International Downtown Association.

This year was such a good experience, tourism officials are considering a repeat performance.

“We are excited about last summer’s results and about proving that collaboration among Baltimore’s cultural attractions and marketing organizations can bring success to all of them,” said Denise Aranoff-Brown, senior director of marketing for the Aquarium. “We are in preliminary talks about how we can collaborate again in the future if the conditions are right, and hope we can bring the Waterfront Invasion back to Baltimore.”