AUGUST 2013 NEWS AND NOTES

As tourists on summer vacations from the US and abroad are filling up LA’s hotels and enjoying our beaches, attractions, museums and restaurants, LATCB continues to work with our members and partners to market and sell our great destination. This month brings news of major new hotel developments on the horizon, a record-breaking dineLA Summer Restaurant Week, LATCB gaining strong and consistent media coverage for the destination and our members and partners, and lots of updates on local industry news.

LATCB President & CEO Ernest Wooden, Jr. was named to the Board of Directors for the L.A. Coalition for the Economy & Jobs. The organization brings together leaders from L.A.’s businesses, labor, academic and non-profit communities to advance policy initiatives that will help to responsibly grow the economy and create quality jobs throughout the Los Angeles region. This organization has identified tourism and convention development as one of its five key initiatives to spur economic and job growth in LA. In 2012, tourism created 10,000 new jobs in LA County, more than any other sector, and employed 324,000 people. Visitors to Los Angeles spent $16.5 billion, generating a total economic impact of $30.5 billion.

To learn more about the LA Coalition on Jobs and the Economy, please visit: www.thelacoalition.com.

Tens of thousands of diners enjoyed dineLA’s wildly popular Restaurant Week July 15 – 26, 2013 for the second Summer Edition. With over 330 restaurants participating, it was the largest restaurant week in the nation, confirming LA’s established spot as one of America’s greatest culinary cities. 

Restaurant Week has contributed a combined $39 million in additional consumer spending to LA’s economy during the last three seasons (Winter 2012, Summer 2012 and Winter 2013). The first dineLA Restaurant Week was held in January 2008 and featured 143 restaurants. Participating restaurants report an average 25% increase in sales during Restaurant Week. 

Los Angeles’ brightest culinary sensations – Father’s Office founder Sang Yoon, Chef Govind Armstrong of Willie Jane and Post & Beam, Stefan Richter of “Top Chef” fame, Ricardo Zarate whose food at Picca and Paiche restaurants earned him Food and Wine Magazine’s recognition as 2011 Best New Chef in American, and many more - invited food lovers to “Eat Your Heart Out.” Diners were offered prix fixe menus specially designed for restaurant week priced at $15, $20, and $25 for lunch and $25, $35, and $45 for dinner. 

For Summer Restaurant Week, dineLA partner American Express created a special promotion offering a $50 American Express Gift Card with a two-night stay booked on www.discoverLosAngeles.com at participating LA hotels. 

The next Restaurant Week will take place in January 2014. For more information, visit www.discoverlosangeles.com/dinela-los-angeles-restaurant-week. 

LATCB hosted two dineLA media events for Summer Restaurant Week. At the first event, on July 9, 22 journalists were offered a progressive dining experience which included samples of menu items, cocktails, kitchen tours and discussions with chefs from some of the headlining restaurants participating in dineLA Restaurant Week. The event was held the week before Restaurant Week to help generate media coverage and social media and boost the popularity of Restaurant Week. 

The second event brought together over 110 social media influencers, bloggers, food writers and photographers to kick-off Summer Restaurant Week with tastings, cocktails and an Instagram contest in partnership with Uber and Greenbar Collective. Four of LA’s hottest restaurants participating in Restaurant Week put together displays offering samples of special dishes from their dineLA Restaurant Week menus. There was also a social media photo scavenger hunt with prizes, resulting in hundreds of beautiful food glamour photos being posted to Instragram and Twitter that collectively reached hundreds of thousands of followers.  

The combined media efforts for dineLA Summer Restaurant Week resulted in an ad value equivalent of more than $1 million in media coverage and publicity for the restaurants of Los Angeles and the city as a whole.  

Anime Expo celebrated its 22nd year with a record 61,000 attendees and turnstile attendance of over 161,000 for the annual Japanese pop culture convention, July 4 to 7, 2013 at the Los Angeles Convention Center. The event, held each year by the Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation, is North America's largest celebration of Japanese culture. The Expo included a packed show at Club Nokia for a legendary Japanese rock band, appearances by big names in the anime world, fashion shows, a game arcade, and the Anime Expo's first “Shinjuku Masquerade Ball,” attended by hundreds of fantastically costumed guests.

A recent article on Skift.com, a travel news and insight website, highlighting “The 12 Biggest Travel Trends Over The Past Year” included LATCB in their list of best Destination Market Organizations that are leading the way in their use of social media and online marketing. The article calls out LATCB as among the "notable DMOs already exercising initiatives that will bring the industry’s outdated marketing model into the 21st century." To read the article, visit http://tiny.cc/xyz50w.

A related article on Skift.com ranks Los Angeles and LATCB’s Twitter feed @discoverla, among the top ten most popular U.S. cities on Twitter. To see the article, visit skift.com/2013/01/18/what-cities-were-talking-to-on-twitter. 

LATCB President & CEO Ernest Wooden, Jr. joined LA Mayor Eric Garcetti for a press conference to announce that President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama will serve as Honorary Chairs of the 2015 Special Olympics World Games in Los Angeles. In 2012, LATCB booked the Special Olympics to take place in Los Angeles in 2015. The Special Olympics is expected to bring 500,000 spectators and media representatives, 7,000 athletes and 3,000 coaches from 170 countries, to Los Angeles for the games occurring July 24 to August 2, 2015. The Special Olympics is expected to generate more than $415 million in economic impact, and will feature 25 events at venues throughout the LA region. The games are expected to be the largest single event to be staged in the City of Los Angeles since the 1984 Olympic Games and are projected be the largest sports and humanitarian event held anywhere in the world in 2015. 

To see President Obama’s video greeting for the 2015 Special Olympics in LA, visit http://bit.ly/13jINUZ.

Michael McDowell, LATCB’s Senior Director, Arts and Culture and Affinity Markets, has been elected to the Board of Directors for the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce (LAGLCC). The LAGLCC is an organization of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and gay-allied businesses, professionals, and individuals, who have joined together to effect positive growth in the community. Michael’s election will allow LATCB to further demonstrate support for the LGBT community and grow LGBT visitation to Los Angeles. 

For more information about the LAGLCC, visit www.laglcc.org.

U.S. TRAVEL ASSOCATION LAUNCHES “TRAVELERS VOICE” TO IMPROVE U.S. ENTRY PROCESS

The U.S. Travel Association has announced that this month it is launching “Traveler’s Voice,” a website designed to help deliver appeals from travelers to improve the U.S. entry process in order to help grow international travel to the United States. The website features video messages from international travelers immediately following their exit from immigration and customs checkpoints, collected at gateway airports in Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles and Orlando. The website includes messages from travelers urging public officials to invest in improvements to the entry process into the United States to alleviate delays and wait times. 

To see the videos or for more information, visit www.travelersvoice.org. 

The Los Angeles City Council unanimously approved the proposed Millennium Hollywood project, which would bring two 30-plus-story skyscrapers to Vine St. near Hollywood Blvd. The project, proposed by New York-based developer Millennium Partners, would feature two towers, one standing 35 stories tall and the other 39 stories, with more than 400 residential units and 200 luxury hotel rooms, office space, restaurants and a fitness club. The vote was for approval of the concept only. For more information, please visit http://millenniumhollywood.net/.

Former Los Angeles School Board Member Nury Martinez was elected to the Los Angeles City Council representing the Sixth District on July 23. Her district covers much of the eastern and central San Fernando Valley.  She will join the new Mayor, Eric Garcetti, new City Attorney, Controller, and several other new City Councilmembers who took office on July 1, 2013.  

For a directory listing the office contact information for all of the Councilmembers, visit www.lacity.org/government/ElectedOfficialOffices/CityCouncil/CouncilDir…;

For the Mayor’s office, visit mayor.lacity.org. For the City Attorney’s office, visit atty.lacity.org. For the City Controller’s office, visit controller.lacity.org.