OAKLAND — Much of Oakland’s tourism boom in the last few years has centered around just a few neighborhoods, but city leaders are trying to change that.
In a new marketing campaign, dubbed “Oakland Spotlight,” the city’s marketing arm, Visit Oakland, and the office of Mayor Libby Schaaf are teaming up to highlight each of Oakland’s individual neighborhoods.
The team kicked off the effort with a press conference Monday in the heart of its first “spotlight” neighborhood: Fruitvale.
“Visitors like to live like a local, and that’s what our spotlight is about,” said Visit Oakland CEO Mark Everton.
The idea of living like a local when traveling has become a popular one. Companies like Airbnb have deployed the same notion in marketing campaigns. But city leaders Monday added that this campaign is geared not just toward tourists but also to help Oaklanders discover their city and generate traffic for local businesses.
Each month, the campaign will feature information on a particular neighborhood on OaklandSpotlight.com and promote it through Visit Oakland’s social media channels. With input from community groups and leaders, Visit Oakland will offer information on cultural activities, events, restaurants and retail in each neighborhood that it features. The Fruitvale launch, for example, promotes the neighborhood’s Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) festival at the end of the month.
“This is one of my personal favorite neighborhoods,” Schaaf said at the event Monday held at Fruitvale Village, adjacent to BART, mentioning local businesses such as Nieves Cinco de Mayo ice cream shop, and attractions such as the Peralta Hacienda Historic Park. There are 350 businesses in the Fruitvale neighborhood. “This is what makes Oakland the exciting, vibrant place it is.”
Visit Oakland has found success in its previous efforts to boost Oakland’s tourism. According to Everton, 3.6 million visitors came to Oakland in 2015, an 8.1 increase over 2014, and those visitors spent roughly $607 million. That growth followed multiple advertising campaigns and an increase to Visit Oakland’s funding by way of a hotel tax. Thanks to an increase in business and leisure travel, hotel occupancy in Oakland was at its highest average in 2015 at 80 percent.
“Oakland’s tourism industry has seen remarkable growth in recent years and has quickly become a critical economic engine and job creator,” Everton said.
Other neighborhoods featured in the program will include Koreatown-Northgate, East and West Oakland, and others.
