In a Tough Economy, Northfield Tourism Gets Extra Attention
Rounding up tourist dollars
BY KAITLIN MUTH
“People come to Northfield for a lot of different reasons,” says Northfield Mayor Mary Rossing.
Last Saturday, for example, Will Rolf, a St. Paul realtor, came to see a show in town.
With daughter Kata, 16, and son Noah, 14, in tow, Rolf made the hour-long drive from his home in St. Paul, down I-35 to Northfield in order to see a production of Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure at Carleton College.
By doing so, Rolf became a hot commodity in Northfield, especially in difficult economic times: a tourist bringing spending money from out-of-town.
Over the past year, increased city attention has gone into strategies to attract tourists to Northfield, of which there are several.
The biggest draw for Northfield – certainly its most visible — is its special events.
Out-of-Towners
The Defeat of Jesse James Days attracts over 100,000 visitors over a weekend of festivities and is “the largest all-volunteer celebration in Minnesota,” Rossing said.
Northfield’s upcoming Winter Walk also brings in lots of out-of-towners, and Rossing estimates that St. Olaf’s Christmas Festival attracts a crowd of “four thousand people per night.”
Recreational opportunities are another Northfield tourist magnet, Rossing said.
“One of the things I’m really pushing is continuation of our bike and trail system,” Rossing said. Specifically, she advocates the construction of a trail on the east side of the Cannon River, extending from Northfield to Dundas.
The new trail would connect by bridge in each city to the existing trail on the west bank, completing a six-mile loop. “That would be a very big draw,” Rossing said.
Northfield City Council member Rhonda Powell agrees.
Music Scene
“People enjoy the scenery, the shops, the bike trails, the arboretum,” Powell said. “Our arts and culture both are a strong draw for people.”
“The more things we can have like that, with a recreational activity, an arts activity, an event,” Rossing adds, the more people will be drawn as well to Northfield’s “great music scene, great local pubs and restaurants.”
With recreational and cultural activities each drawing visitors, a virtuous circle would be established with tourists originally coming for one activity then discovering – and later returning – to enjoy the other activity, or both.
The two colleges in town, St. Olaf and Carleton, also act as magnets that can draw someone from the cities for a college-related trip, that can later turn into a tourist visit.
That was Rolf’s experience. He made his recent Northfield trip because “my son really likes Shakespeare, and I noticed they were doing a Shakespeare play and I thought it would be a good opportunity for him. And I figured going to see it at the college was cheaper than going to see it at the Guthrie.”
Marketing Muscle
But Rolf also noted that he’d learned about the show from a trip to Carleton in October, when he accompanied a friend who was visiting her daughter at school.
Despite efforts by the Economic Development Authority and the Convention and Visitors Bureau, it was really Carleton College that had marketed the town to him.
Rossing acknowledged this marketing dynamic, an obvious boon to the city, also highlights the city’s own relatively weak marketing strength.
Referring to Northfield’s vibrant downtown culture, she said “we don’t have a good way to market that beyond our borders.”
Still, the Economic Development Association is working to its efforts to draw in more tourists, Powell said. She pointed to efforts to advertise online through Explore Minnesota, and to the recently revamped Convention and Visitors Bureau’s Visiting Northfield web site.
Quaint Town
Rolf thought that advertising in Minnesota Monthly or on Minnesota Public Radio would find the kind of person who would be attracted to Northfield: “People who are looking for the quaint, small town experience.”
Council member Powell noted that Northfield might best be advertised through word of mouth.
“It’s like a gem that’s well hidden,” she said. “People have to discover it for themselves.”
Now that Rolf has visited a couple of times, he would seem to agree.
“I would come back,” he said.
Copyright @ 2009 Pressville
