MOUNT AIRY — The Destination Marketing Association of North Carolina held its annual Award Ceremony in late October to award those for innovative, best practices, creativity and outstanding efforts in tourism marketing.
Two organizations in Surry County were awarded — the Award in Gold for Best Newsletter by the Mount Airy Tourism Development Authority for the Mayberry to Merlot Newsletter and Award in Gold for the Tourism Partnership of Surry County for Best Marketing Initiative for the Ohio Campaign.
The DMANC banquet was held in October 2014 in Winston-Salem where the organizations were both recognized during the Award Banquet. Jessica Icenhour Roberts, director of Tourism and Marketing for the Mount Airy Tourism Development Authority, and Jessica Johnson, assistant director of Marketing, attended the banquet as representatives for the Mount Airy TDA and Tourism Partnership of Surry County.
The Mount Airy Tourism Development Authority and Mount Airy Visitors Center were awarded a Gold Award in the category of Destination Marketing Achievement Award for Best Newsletter. The Mayberry to Merlot newsletter is distributed to more than 35,000 recipients on a monthly basis including those who are tourism-related businesses in Mount Airy and Surry County. Each month the newsletter promotes upcoming events, packages, and different themes. The Mount Airy TDA is led by Chairman, Lenise Lynch at Hampton Inn Mount Airy and other board members, Vice Chairman, Ben Webb at Old North State Winery, Treasurer, Trudy Willard at Holiday Inn Express, Secretary, Magen Atkinson at Cross Creek Country Club, Commissioner Shirley Brinkley, Jatin Patel at Comfort Inn and Knights Inn, Chad Tidd at Chick-fil-a, and Pam Stone at city of Mount Airy.
A Gold Award was presented to the Tourism Partnership of Surry County in the category of Destination Marketing Achievement Award for the Ohio Campaign. This campaign was launched in spring 2014 and continued through the summer of 2014 and focused on targeting Ohio visitors who were already coming through to the area when coming to the beach down I-77 as the county gets many of these that come through and has been focusing on getting them to come back and/or stay longer as many of them stay overnight now on the way to the beach and on the way back from the beach. The Tourism Partnership is led by Chairman, Burke Robertson, Surry County representative and board members, Vice Chair, Leslie Schlender as Elkin representative, Treasurer, Lenise Lynch as Mount Airy representative, Scott Needham as Pilot Mountain representative, and Ed Shelton as Dobson representative.
The awards were presented at the DMANC annual awards banquet and award entries were submitted by tourism departments, Chamber of Commerce’s and visitors bureaus across North Carolina with all sizes of budgets. The judges were national tourism professionals including advertising agency representatives and marketing specialists. Jessica Icenhour Roberts submitted the awards on behalf of the Mount Airy Tourism Development Authority and Tourism Partnership of Surry County.
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