Come Up North

COME UP NORTH … (With Your COVID)?

The fine line between saving a tourism-based economy and saving lives

By Patrick Sullivan chock full of destinations Pure Michigan Time Pub (the latter three are temporarily promotes, it’s difficult to know whether to closed due). He said he appreciates the Pure

After a year-long hiatus, the state’s Pure embrace or shudder at this latest campaign, Michigan campaign and what it does to Michigan campaign re-launched late last which is showing up on social media, print stimulate the state’s economy, but that amid month with a $1.2 million effort showcasing publications, billboards, and TV spots and the pandemic, the state’s been too hard on the Michigan’s winter playgrounds. Its intent: to targeting markets like Detroit, Grand Rapids hospitality industry, especially restaurants. reinvigorate the state’s moribund tourism and Flint, as well as Fort Wayne, Indiana; “Michigan is one of our nation’s best travel economy by luring visitors in and outside the Toledo, Ohio; Green Bay, Wisconsin, and and tourism states, and the Pure Michigan state to visit places like northern Michigan Minneapolis, Minnesota. campaign, which from its inception was this season. For the region’s tourism-driven brilliant, really helped inject lifeblood to

While the Michigan Department of businesses, the response to the $1.2 million take us to another level,” Lobdell said. “But Health and Human Services hasn’t issued effort likely depends on whether they stand I think the current leadership of our state interstate travel restrictions or quarantine to benefit from the campaign. Nevertheless, doesn’t prioritize the hospitality industry. recommendations this winter, it has not it begs a bigger question of us all: Are the … Restaurants have received the brunt of only been urging people to strictly limit gatherings and interactions to those within their own household but also — since Nov. “I think it’s ridiculous. Where do they go? I realize 18, 2020 — maintained the closure of indoor dining at all restaurants and bars, alongside the hotels are open. I guess the casinos are open,” mask requirements and capacity restrictions on many of the state’s tourism-related she said. “To me, if you’re asking people to travel, entertainment venues, like casinos, movie and live theaters, concert halls, sporting what will they do when they travel? events and arenas, indoor pools, and more.

David Lorenz, vice president of Travel people who are willing to travel for pleasure the closures as though our restaurants our Michigan, defends the decision to launch during a pandemic the same folks who are hotels, our community gathering places the winter campaign, one he said was willing to do as the Pure Michigan pledge are less essential than other businesses. It’s carefully crafted to get Michigan residents and MDHHS suggest — wear a face mask frustrating as a restauranteur.” and those who live near Michigan to plan in public, frequently wash their hands, and Lobdell’s frustration is common short trips even while they adhere to limit interactions with people outside the throughout the restaurant industry in the COVID-19 safety guidelines. residents in their household? And even if state, even as the last days of January tick

“I’m really pleased so far that it seems to they are, should the state encourage them to away and restaurants and bars are slated to be having a positive impact on encouraging travel at the same time it’s limiting what many open again beginning Feb. 1. people to safely travel, because that’s part of tourism-dependent businesses can do? Lobdell said his company has done what it,” Lorenz said. “We’re not just saying, ‘Go it can to make sure its employees survive out there.’ We’re saying, ‘Listen, when you UNSUSTAINABLE during the closures, which he calculates have are ready to travel, make sure you’re doing Jeff Lobdell is president of Restaurant taken up over 45 percent of days since they it safely by taking what we call the Pure Partners Management LLC, owners of 17 began last March. Michigan pledge — that’s literally pledging properties, including Traverse City’s Apache Lobdell said he was upset by the mixed that you’re gonna keep other people safe by Trout Grill, Omelette Shoppe on Front Street signals sent by Gov. Whitmer and the doing all the precautions.’” (both currently open for carryout only), plus state health department, which sometimes

For Northerners, people whose lives and the Omelette Shoppe on Cass Street, Flap Jack seemed to offer hope that restaurants could livelihood are deeply entwined in a region Shack, and, in Suttons Bay, Boone’s Prime re-open only to reverse course. 10 • jan 25, 2021 • Northern Express Weekly

“The frustration is getting to desperation for the industry workers when they’re getting toyed with like this,” Lobdell said. “That’s a lot of days that the dining rooms have been closed and I feel for all the restaurants that have now closed and will never reopen.”

Once a week, Lobdell said, his company hands out food and aid to its employees in Grand Rapids and Traverse City to make sure they have enough to eat. Some of the restaurants have stayed open to offer carryout, but Lobdell said they don’t do that because it makes sense as a business decision, but rather they do it in order to keep some staff employed.

“Most restaurants do takeout as a courtesy. It’s not a business-sustaining model,” Lobdell said. “You’re operating at a greater loss than just shutting your doors, turning down your utilities, and just paying your rent.”

Toni Bohnett, owner and manager of Yankee Boy restaurant in South Boardman, north of Kingsley, said she for one, doesn’t understand the Pure Michigan campaign launching to bring in tourists while the restaurants are closed.

“I think it’s ridiculous. Where do they go? I realize the hotels are open. I guess the casinos are open,” she said. “To me, if you’re asking people to travel, what will they do when they travel?

She said that in addition to lost revenue during the closures, she’s lost $10,000 in perishable food because she’s had to close.

“It’s gone on long enough. I feel like the restaurant industry is being targeted because it can be, through the health department,” she said. “For a lot of places, it’s coming to a sink or swim.”

OPPORTUNITY AND OUTLETS

Paul Beachnau, executive director of the Gaylord Area Tourism Bureau, likes the

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message sent by this season’s Pure Michigan ads because it is in tune with how most Michigan residents feel right now. Most are reluctant to fly because of the pandemic, but they might be willing to drive a bit in order to get somewhere for a getaway.

“People want to travel, and people want to take part in outdoor activities. It appears numbers are going in the right direction,” Beachnau said. “People are willing to drive a little bit farther; not everyone’s comfortable getting into an airplane.”

While one Gaylord restaurant — the Iron Pig Smokehouse — has gained notoriety for defying the restaurant closure order and then held a largely mask-less cookout in protest of the state cracking down on its food and liquor licenses, most businesses around Gaylord are doing their best to play by the rules and to keep people safe, Beachnau said.

“That is the way it is for this individual business, but our restauranteurs in Gaylord for the most part, they’re trying to change the rules,” Beachnau said.

Across Gaylord, businesses are doing their best to be safe, he said.

“Our industry has done an excellent job of adhering to cleanliness and safety standards,” Beachnau said. “You can travel safely if you adhere to the rules. And jobs depend upon it, and here’s the other thing — if you’re uncomfortable traveling, then don’t travel.”

Chris Hale, vice president of sales and marketing at Schuss Mountain Shanty Creek Resort, said that like Pure Michigan, his resort’s current advertising slogan emphasizes the value of the outdoors.

“Our current marketing campaign — “Bellaire is Fresh Air” — recognizes this moment, and our guests have responded. And isn’t that what we all need, a breath of fresh air?” Hale said.

Hale said he believes Pure Michigan has done a lot for the state and that while it is complicated to promote tourism amid a time of strict restrictions on businesses right now, people are making it work.

“The [Pure Michigan] campaign has reversed negative stereotypes of Michigan, shown the tremendous beauty and recreational variety throughout the state, while generating tremendous regional and national awareness,” he said. “We don’t pretend to be more informed than the healthcare experts. The decisions of the health department and government officials cannot be easy. Our responsibilities are to manage our business the best we can, to take this opportunity to review what we can do that’s best for our staff and our guests, and to be there as an outlet for people to get away and to get outside and play.”

A $ENSIBLE PERSPECTIVE

It’s important to note that, at $1.2 million, Pure Michigan’s winter campaign is only a small portion of the $15 million planned for this year; a much greater portion will go, as it typically has, to the campaigns touting the state’s destinations and recreational opportunities in warmer weather. And even that $15 million is less than half of Pure Michigan’s last spend, for 2018-19, when it enjoyed a $36 million budget. (Gov. Gretchen Whitmer canceled the 2019-2020 advertising budget altogether in a line-item veto.)

Nevertheless, Lorenz said the smaller budget is appropriate given his office’s goals for the advertising.

He said recent surveys have shown that around 50 percent of people are comfortable traveling outside of their communities and that the winter campaign is aimed at getting those people out and spending money around Michigan.

“That’s why it’s important for us to spread the message that you can travel safely, you know, encourage them to take the Pure Michigan pledge, because that 50 percent is still a big number,” he said. “Just in Michigan alone, that would account for about 55 million people. So, you know, we need to encourage that: Stay in the area, support your local state, support your retailers and restaurants as much as you can.”

Michigan offers plenty of outdoor recreation choices in the winter, and the Pure Michigan advertising is focused on those activities — even if there’s been less-thanexpected amounts of snow so far this year and one of the state’s major draws, snowmobiling, isn’t happening in a lot of places.

But one month into the campaign, Lorenz said that Pure Michigan’s target audience is getting the message and following the rules.

“From my visits to Crystal Mountain and to Treetops Resort this last weekend, I could tell that people were appreciative, they were taking the safety protocol seriously, they just plain love being able to get out there, and, of course, they’re enjoying the snow,” Lorenz said. “And skiing is open for business. The outdoors, all outdoors, is always open, and you can do that all safely. And I think it also is a great indicator that people are just having this pent-up demand to get out to enjoy the things that people love to do.”

Lorenz said it was important to launch the Pure Michigan campaign even while parts of the state’s economy were shut down because it was important to get as much of the economy going as possible while staying safe.

“Businesses need customers in order to open, in order to employee people. We provide customers, whether it be in-state residents traveling or out-of-state residents coming in, by encouraging them to travel safely,” he said. “When people are employed, they can pay for their things that they need to pay for, and they can pay taxes. When those tax revenues come in, we can pay for roads and schools and police and all the things that we need to as a society. That’s how the economy rolls.”

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