LT-2018-029-EDA-REstaurant Week-Girls Night Out

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Application part 1 Proiect and event description The Ellensburg Downtown Association (EDA) has been dedicated to downtown revitalization and preservation for many years. The EDA follows the National Main Street Center 4 -Point Approach to ensure that downtown Ellensburg continues to thrive moving toward the future. Successful projects have included the installation of 72 downtown bike racks, roofline lighting and holiday lighting, downtown planters and trash cans, and generation of key development projects like the downtown hotel. We continue to provide accurate and up to date information on our website, maps, and our new Downtown Dining Guides. The EDA hosts a variety of events that drive traffic to the downtown core such as Girls Night Out, Buskers in the Burg, Moments to Remember, and Hoedown in the Downtown. Twice a year, the EDA facilitates an entrepreneur course to encourage local economic development. In the past 7 years, due in part to the efforts of the EDA, downtown has seen a net gain of 30 businesses and more than 7 million in private investment. The EDA has distributed over 20,000 downtown maps annually and has logged more than 20,000 volunteer hours in the last 7 years. Over the years, the EDA has made it a priority to seek out partnerships in order to build relationships and expand our outreach. Thousands of people enjoy downtown Ellensburg each year because of its unique history and offerings such as restaurants, museums and galleries, retail, and services. This application for Lodging Tax will provide assistance to the EDA in promoting downtown and the events that draw people to downtown. The EDA is happy to add new and upgraded events in order to continue providing relevant and desirable activities for visitors and residents alike. Target audiences include those interested in Heritage Tourism, empty nesters and families looking for weekend travel, foodies (Restaurant Week), those interested in outdoor recreation, and families of CWU students. Primary markets for advertising include Yakima, Tri -cities, Wenatchee, Moses Lake, Spokane, and Seattle/Tacoma. -The EDA is looking forward to hosting the 2nd annual Downtown Restaurant Week, taking place in February. Restaurant Weeks are a nationwide trend where participating locations create a special 3 -course menu for a set price that are then advertised together, encouraging customers to experience downtown dining multiple times throughout the week. In 2017, we had 13 restaurants participate and each one had great feedback regarding the event's success. One restaurant had a "summer day of sales" during the slowest time of the year for downtown dining. Another location requested we host Restaurant Week twice a year. Lodging tax would be used to market this event via social media, direct mail postcards, radio ads, and TV ads. We estimate upwards of 600 people attended this event to order the Restaurant Week special. This is not including the people who were attracted to these places by the Restaurant Week promotion, but ended up ordering something off the regular menu. We would love to expand this event to become county wide in the next couple years. -Girls Night Out (GNO) is a community favorite that has brought upward of $50,000 dollars to the downtown core annually. Held twice a year, Spring and Winter, this event encourages the public to shop till they drop at our local downtown retail establishments and dine/drink at our restaurants and bars. This year, the EDA would like to bring in more people from outside of Ellensburg to attend our GNO events and provide feedback. This would be done with a bus that would drive to Yakima, bring 40-50 women to our event, and drive them back to Yakima at the end of the evening. We will also explore a potential bus from Moses Lake. We are also looking to engage our vendors by adding live music in some of the participating locations. We believe these additions to the already successful GNO events will bring a larger crowd and more opportunity to market the event outside of the county, which will bring higher