Create! Eugene is a project of the Arts & Business Alliance of Eugene, ABAE, a 501(c)3 notfor-profit charitable organization. Create! Eugene is a month-long creative arts festival of workshops each August that showcases existing and new events. Create! Eugene features 100+ arts and culinary workshops, including the Plein Air Paint Out, plein air (outdoor painting) workshops in several locations and an international plein air competition (separate competitions for amateurs and professional artists) in downtown Eugene. ABAE’s EugeneAGoGo.com online cultural community and calendar will host information and registration links for workshops. Travel Lane County coordinate hotel packages and incentives. ABAE’s vision is to incorporate a variety of cultural arts workshops, including (but not limited to) visual arts (painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, etc.), dance, music, theater, technical (set building, makeup, costuming, etc.), fashion, textiles, jewelry-making, writing, digital, cooking, brewing, winemaking, and all things creative. In addition to individual artist instructors offering workshops, UO, LCC, and private schools will be invited to create workshops that preview their cultural arts courses and programs. Galleries, wineries, breweries and restaurants will also be invited to offer workshops. Create! Eugene will create an atmosphere of cultural immersion in downtown Eugene with smaller, vibrant satellites in Springfield, UO, and LCC. Workshops will locate in artist studios, cultural institutions like The Shedd, DIVA, Oregon Contemporary Theatre, Hult Center for the Performing Arts, Maude Kerns Art Center, Emerald Art Center, UO, Lane, NEDCO’s Sprout, downtown parks, plazas, restaurants and meeting spaces. Create! Eugene will be marketed to known cultural audiences within a variety of creative disciplines. Social media and on-line targeted email lists will be used extensively to build efficiencies and carefully target prospects. The plein air competition will be a visible and compelling component. Travel Lane County will help drive earned media and tourism marketing through its existing programs. Hanifl & Associates, an independent contractor, will oversee coordination of workshops on the web, marketing, in-festival support, and post event measurement, evaluation, and reporting. Brent Hanifl has several years’ experience overseeing a similar festival in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Participants will typically register directly with the workshop providers. The plein air competition will have some centralized, coordinated events as part of this project. Create! Eugene will help to brand Eugene and the surrounding area as a cultural and creative tourism destination, generate visitor spending, and increase cultural sector revenues. It will target creative patrons associated with cultural organizations within a 300 mile drive radius along with already-identified national and international channels. Hotel packages will incentivize participation in multiple workshops. We will leverage existing festivals, great weather, and the strong travel demand that already exists in August. This project supports ABAE and the City’s work in developing a downtown cultural district. It marries a strong local cultural collaboration
with economic development. Our largely on-line marketing plans dovetail with Travel Lane County's, and Travel Oregon’s growing efficiency in generating overnight stays through targeted on-line communications. Measurements will include partner satisfaction (survey), artist instructor satisfaction (survey), workshop registration counts, festival participant satisfaction (survey), participating hotel satisfaction (survey), hotel room booking counts, sponsor satisfaction (survey), and sponsor revenue. Short term success will be to meet goals of 80+ workshops, 500 workshop registrations, and 150 room nights. Estimated economic impact (eei) at $166 per out of area attendee (150) per day (2) and $57 per local attendee (350) per day (2) results in a modest estimated economic impact goal for year one of $89,700. In addition, all actions (clicks, likes, etc.) taken from social media and online marketing will be measured. We will establish earned revenue mechanisms for per registration and per room night bookings. We will measure earned media (media coverage that is not paid for). Long term, success will be measured by growing participants, room nights, eei, sponsorship, earned media, festival reputation, year around use of EugeneAGoGo.com for workshops, and awareness of Eugene as a cultural destination over time. Estimated planning timeline (remaining): March –Build out workshop calendar, secure venues and related logistics, ensure protocols are set up on EugeneAGoGo.com for promotion and registration. Build event, venue, and category matrices to create an overlay for the month and guide content into tracks that are easy for visitors to purchase. April - Finalize hotel tourism packages. Initiate registration. Launch festival hotel micro-site. Finalize and implement communications and marketing plans. Cross-promote with existing events. April- July – Marketing, registration, logistics. August – Create! Eugene September – Surveys, measurements, reports. Information Contacts: Create! Eugene Coordinator: Brent Hanifl B.E.Hanifl & Associates 608-792-5746 behanifl@gmail.com brenthanifl.com
Karen Rainsong, Managing Director Arts & Business Alliance of Eugene / ABAE 1401 Willamette Street Eugene, OR 97401 541.242.2364 Abae.director@gmail.com
Kari Westlund, President & CEO Travel Lane County 7584 Olive Street Eugene, OR 97401 541-743-8750 kari@travellanecounty.org