Why does the Wall Street Journal cover Connecticut? Because there’s plenty of moolah here (and lots of other great stuff). Governor Dannel Malloy kicked off a campaign today to revive the tourism industry his predecessor Jodi Rell mothballed. If you believe perception is reality, suburbanites have perceptions about Bridgeport. Arrogant New Yorkers have perceptions about Connecticut. Perceptions can be changed. Don’t ya just love the way New Yorkers tool on Connecticut then retreat to their weekend homes here? Yes, it’s all a conspiracy to keep away interlopers. WSJ scribe Shelly Banjo, who lives in Manhattan, provides her take. She quotes one Connecticut resident via New York who’s still in a Brooklyn Dodgers state of mind. Can’t get da Bums out of his head. Banjo’s story:
After spending $22 million on a soul-searching advertising campaign, Connecticut proclaimed Monday that the state is “Still Revolutionary.”
That new tagline is set to be unveiled Monday in an announcement by Gov. Dannel Malloy at Hartford’s 18th-century Old Statehouse building. Television and radio spots are slated to hit the airwaves this week, along with a social-media push. A two-year advertising campaign built around the phrase hopes to bring in tourists, spur economic development and re-instill pride in Connecticut residents.
Malloy’s tourism announcement comes nearly two years after he ran for governor promising quite literally to put Connecticut back on the map. His predecessor, Gov. M. Jodi Rell, cut the tourism budget to $1 in 2010. After the state failed to pay a $100,000 membership fee to Discover New England, Connecticut was removed from the regional marketing alliance’s promotional map.
A self-proclaimed history buff, Mr. Malloy has made it a personal mission to burnish Connecticut’s connection to its Revolutionary War-era legacy. At a time when the state has had to cut billions from its budget, he has pushed through a $27 million tourism campaign.
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Connecticut wants its ‘I love New York’ moment,” said Jim Ritterhoff, a partner at New York ad agency Chowder Inc., one of four firms tapped by the Connecticut to lead the campaign. “Not only did it promote the state but it made residents stop and think about what it meant to be a New Yorker.”Earlier this spring, Ritterhoff and his advertising team sat in Manhattan kicking around ideas on how to boost public impressions of New York’s oft-overlooked neighbor. Connecticut presented a very different challenge from Chowder’s previous tourism client, the Cayman Islands.
The group tried to match words like inspiration, spark and character to photos of Connecticut’s coastline and countryside. The ad agency had already started gathering material through an online contest dubbed “My Connecticut Story,” which drew hundreds of user submissions presenting moments linked to the state.
For the ad makers at Chowder, some problems with the state’s tourism pitch were obvious. A visit to the website VisitConnecticut.com, for instance, directed users to a page called “New England Tourism.”
An initial slate of advertising proposals failed to persuade a panel of cultural and economic leaders, including the governor’s wife, Cathy Malloy, who last year took the helm of the Greater Hartford Arts Council. After that impasse, Chowder had to craft an all-new pitch within weeks.
“Right now people see it as a drive-through state–that stretch of highway between New York and Boston,” Ritterhoff joked. “I think they’re scared to be too big but we have to find a way to get them to chest-pound a little bit.”
A few days later, Rittenhoff peered through a one-way observation glass at 10 middle-aged market research participants who came to a white-washed corporate office in Westchester, NY, to talk about Connecticut.
“Is it OK for a state to brag?” the focus group’s facilitator asked.
“Not Connecticut,” shot back one participant. “Out of 50 states, I don’t think anyone would say that Connecticut is the most inspiring.”
Another woman chimed in: “Connecticut is trying too hard to be something it’s not, let’s just embrace the fact that it’s a nice, quiet and relaxing place to live with our kids.”
As participants spoke in modest terms about the state, the public relations team cautioned that focus groups can sometimes be skewed by what they called outliers. They also mentioned this was just one of many focus groups the state would hold. But state officials expected to confront diminished public enthusiasm.
“The lack of any state marketing to try to reinforce the positive attributes of the state created a condition,” said Kip Bergstrom, deputy director of the state’s Department of Economic and Community Development. “Now, the medicine is to make a significant marketing investment to change the perception of Connecticut.”
Unlike most state tourism campaigns focused solely on luring outsiders to visit, Connecticut’s ad blitz is also designed to give state residents more pride of place.
“After all, the best way to boost confidence in the girl with low self-esteem at the dance is to ask her to dance,” said Jim Taylor, vice chairman of the Harrison Group, a market-research firm that worked on the tourism project and a resident of Southbury, Conn.
Still, not everyone is convinced. Some residents are scoffing at the notion of spending millions to promote a state with little hope of emerging from the shadows of neighboring New York or Massachusetts.
“I live in a beautiful house in New Milford and I really like it here, but do I love Connecticut the same way I love New York or the Brooklyn Dodgers? The emotional connection just isn’t there,” said Richard Sacks, a retired New Yorker magazine fact-checker who moved to Connecticut more than 20 years ago.
Like Sacks, many Connecticut residents are drawn to the state for the calm found once drivers travel far enough from New York City on the Merritt Parkway that the street lamps stop shining.
“A slogan like, ‘Hey, it’s pretty nice here’ might work,” said Sacks. “Pride on the other hand? Well, pride is a deep-rooted affection that just can’t be manufactured–you either got it or you don’t.”
“Great place to live, but I wouldn’t want to vacation there!” That sounds like the attitude of the focus group perhaps, and many of those who commute (or used to commute) to NYC while finding Litchfield, Fairfield and New Haven shoreline communities their choice for 50 weeks of the year.
And mentioning Brooklyn, next year sport will return to that borough of NYC but the ball is bigger and lots else has changed in 50 years. So keep the little, human-sized events coming, daily and weekly throughout the year, and talk them up because talented people are at work. And people need places to eat out, to hear music, see movies, witness places and hear stories of important history. CT has such places from dinosaur footprints to outer space technology and lots in between. Time will tell.
I lived in New York for four years during my college years (which ended last year) and I must say CT does not have anything on New York. I love New York and love the diversity.
I want a campaign that says “if you don’t have the grit, determination and skills to make it in Connecticut, keep driving!”
Chowder should be penalized for asking Connecticut residents to supply content for their ads via their “My Connecticut Story” on a state web site. So far, the stories are weak. Focus groups are agencies lost in the wilderness. I’m a history buff, too. Connecticut isn’t waiting for its “I love New York” moment–that slogan is 25 years old! Revolutionary States require original campaigns.
Full disclosure: I finger-poked Jim Ritterhoff in the chest during a recent meeting in downtown Bridgeport. I gave him my postcard and told him I was brand new in the advertising business.
I don’t know what else this advertising agency is doing, but the TV ad I saw sucked.
The biggest role Connecticut played in the Revolutionary War was having seacoast towns burned by the British. Connecticut privateers drove the British Navy crazy in Long Island Sound, and towns (Fairfield, Norwalk etc.) were sacked in revenge. The British packet ship from Virginia warned campaign headquarters in New York the French and the American armies were surrounding Yorktown was intercepted by a Connecticut privateer. The British were not able to bail out Yorktown and that won the Revolutionary War for the Americans. The name of that Connecticut ship has been lost to history, apparently. I’m willing to bet it was for good reason: those Long Island Sound guys were great smugglers.
Connecticut’s most historical American role was as a participant in the 19th Century New England industrial revolution. How do you celebrate the manufacturing of widgets that are now made in China?
The old Gateway to New England slogan I think is best. Just keep everyone away from places like Bridgeport and Willimantic.
You are completely mad and that’s just the way you (me too) like it!
I speak truth.The state campaign sucks.
Whaddaya want? Video of Mayor Bill fly-fishing for Pirelli radial tires in Bunnell’s Pond?
No, I wouldn’t want that tire sponsorship because it would disrupt the moment of pristine tranquility with Bill up to his boots in pond water and the caption: “Surprise, It’s Bridgeport!”
If he pulled out a tire there would be nothing of moment to provide contrast to the expectations of viewers. Maybe the Mayor can find some downcounty hedge-fund money (some jobs for the movie industry), weave in a little greenery (getting shad to attempt the Pequonnock), combine it with an original Adam Wood script (a fantasy about the Mayor telling the whole truth and nothing but the truth about a subject–that would make the movie a true “short subject” film) and call it “Shad Running in Bridgeport–Finch In Boots.” Not exactly “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen” or “The River Runs Through It” but certainly something to play at the Bijou soon. Time will tell.
I don’t think a shad run would work so good, John. The fish would probably be asphyxiated by the time they hit the Grand Street Bridge.
There’s a lot of good starting points for consideration though. “Something Runs Through It” has potential.
*** Perceptions of a past nostalgic New England State like CT have faded throughout the years. It’s going to take teamwork from the State legislators along with local government to turn this state into a real place of interest tourists would want to visit more than once. And of course a great benefit to the state’s economy over time. Spend money to make more money! *** BUILD IT AND THEY WILL COME! ***