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Beginning July 1 Travel Salem’s Travel Café Visitors Center will have new hours; Monday through Friday 10:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., closed Saturday and Sunday. These changes are a result of program realignment due to budget restrictions. Travel Salem will continue to maintain program continuity and delivery in a manner that is consistent with visitor expectations.

“The new hours reflect the time of the day with the highest visitor volume,” said Angie Morris, Travel Salem’s CEO. “Our professional staff serve as

Motorcycle event attracts 9,000 riders

The BMW Motorcycle Owners of America (MOA) has selected the Oregon State Fairgrounds in Salem, Oregon as the location for their 2013 International Rally. The event will be taking place July 18-20, 2013. “We’ve had some really great events in Oregon in the past years,” explains BMW MOA president Greg Feeler. “Our Rally in Redmond in 2010 was one of our best ever. We are very excited about Salem next year!”

In partnership with the Oregon Sate Fair and Expo Center, Travel Salem was instrumental in attracting the BMW MOA group to Salem. The Rally was initially bid on

Would you like to promote your business to out of town visitors this summer? Travel Salem is seeking your coupons, special offers or promotional items (restaurant offers are especially needed) to be included at on-site welcome tables and/or in visitor information packets. Here is a sample of some larger groups coming this summer:

If you’d like to get your coupons, special offers or promotional items in front of these visitors

Oregon’s Wine Country license plate is now available through the DMV. This wine country specialty license plate is the first of its kind in the nation. Plates are available from the DMV for an ongoing $30 surcharge due at issuance and every two-year renewal.

Wine Country plate proceeds will be directed to the Oregon Tourism Commission to support the promotion of Oregon as a travel & tourism destination, and will be distributed as follows:

Travel Salem recently unveiled the official 2012-13 Salem Area Visitors Guide. This 65 page, full color visitors guide promotes Salem as well as Marion and Polk counties. Trip ideas, attractions and points of interest, lodging, dining, events, shopping, wineries, gardens, agri-tourism, transportation, recreation and relocation information resources are included along with tour ideas and stories.

“The Salem Area Visitors Guide plays a vital role in promoting the area for

Travel Salem is proud to announce the recipients of the 2011-12 Absolutely Fabulous Awards presented at their May 17, 2012 Marketing Exchange luncheon.

The annual Ab Fab (Absolutely Fabulous) awards recognize people and organizations in the Salem area (including Marion & Polk counties) that have pushed the envelope and turned ideas upside-down and inside out to capture the best return on their marketing, collaboration, partnerships, innovation and regional strategies! They are Absolutely Fabulous!

The eight Travel Salem Ab Fab awards were presented to:

Would you like to promote your business to out of town visitors this summer? Travel Salem is seeking your coupons, special offers or promotional items (restaurant offers are especially needed) to be included at on-site welcome tables and/or in visitor information packets. Here is a sample of some larger groups coming this summer:

Thursday, May 17, 2012
11:45 a.m. – 1:15 p.m.

Keizer Renaissance Inn
5188 Wittenberg Lane N
Keizer, OR 97303

Call 503-581-4325 ext. 58 now to reserve your seat!

Sponsored by:

Madrona Hills Ace Hardware
Salem Trophy

The NAIA Men’s Golf National Championships, co-hosted by Corban University, the Cascade Collegiate Conference and Creekside Golf Club, are coming to Salem, May 22-25, 2012. Thirty teams from across the U.S. will be competing at Creekside Golf Club, one of Oregon’s top courses. Most of the teams will stay in Salem for five or six nights and have up to ten men per team. Get your business in front of these teams and their families by

The NAIA Men’s Golf National Championships, co-hosted by Corban University, the Cascade Collegiate Conference and Creekside Golf Club are coming to Salem, May 22-25, 2012. Thirty teams from across the U.S. will be competing at Creekside Golf Club, one of Oregon’s top courses. Volunteers are needed as spotters, drivers, at the VIP tent and many other duties, for all day or half day shifts.

If you love golf and would like to help make this tournament a huge success, contact Danny Bisgaard, Volunteer Coordinator at 503-588-8162 or d.bisgaard@comcast.net for more information.

Be sure you stand out and reach more visitors by showcasing your business on a kiosk panel in the Travel Salem Travel Café Visitors Center. One of these 22” x 36” or 22” x 30” panels can be yours, or you can co-op the panel with other businesses. This offer includes space for your company brochure.

There are a limited number of panels so act quickly to reserve your panel today! Travel Salem is offering an introductory price of $100/month for the panel plus the cost of design (12 month minimum commitment).

The Travel Salem Travel Café is a full-service Visitors Center offering a wide array of services, where a professional staff person will customize each visitor’s Salem area experience.

For more information, contact Tina Winge at 503-581-4325 ext. 59 or membership@TravelSalem.com.

Celebrate Mothers and Experience Local Products and Services

May 2 First Wednesday at Travel Salem will focus on Mothers and local products and services such as wine, food, flowers, handbags, specialty gifts and planting demonstrations. Travel Salem’s Travel Café Visitors Center will be open until 8 p.m. on First Wednesday and is located at 181 High Street NE, Salem.

The following Travel Salem member businesses will be highlighted:

Alright, you Oregon lovers out there. It's time to put your passion to the test with the Travel Oregon Adventurecation challenge. Think you've got it nailed, do you? Best hike in the gorge. Once-in-a-lifetime mountain biking trip. The perfect surf break. Tell us all about it. We want to see your Adventurecation bucket list! And what's more...you have the chance to win one of 11 Oregon adventure giveaways!

Would you like to see your travel deals on Travel Oregon's Adventurecation page? Check out the link on "how to submit your deals and travel packages."

If you haven’t already met Travel Salem’s Golden Pioneer, we’d like to introduce you to our pal Sal, everybody’s favorite guy because he is part of Travel Salem’s Golden Pioneer Giveaway, where visitors and folks in the community can win freebies if they log onto Travel Salem’s Facebook page. People have to “guess where the Golden Pioneer is,” in a kind of Where’s Waldo fashion or participate in other Travel Salem contests which change monthly.

Borrow Sal for the Day!

As members, you have the opportunity

Your one-stop source for ticketing needs is AbsolutelyTix, a state-of-the-art network for Marion and Polk Counties. AbsolutelyTix allow consumers to easily purchase tickets at the Travel Café Visitors Center or online, and provides a single source of online information about upcoming local shows and events. 

More than 24 partners (and growing) — local arts organizations, non-profits, and other community organizations — have partnered with Travel Salem to sell tickets and transact other business over the Internet. Some partners include:

Oregon’s Premier Gathering for Tourism Professionals

Salem will be the host of the 2013 Oregon Governor’s Conference on Tourism, April 14-16, 2013. As Oregon’s premier gathering for tourism professionals, the annual conference attracts more than 400 attendees for two and a half days of educational seminars, networking, and to develop new ways to create the best Oregon Experience possible for visitors and the industry.

Travel Salem, in partnership with the Salem Conference Center

This is the “last call” to lock in your advertisement for the 2012-13 Salem Area Visitor Guide. Ad sales will close Friday, March 9. Businesses interested in purchasing a display ad should contact Terra Moreland at terram@mediamerica.net or 503-445-8830.

The Salem Area Visitor Guide is the official

Travel Salem’s First & Second Quarter Reports are available for review at TravelSalem.com.

Questions? Contact Angie Morris, Travel Salem's President and CEO at amorris@TravelSalem.com or 503-581-4325, ext. 26.

Travel Salem is currently collecting travel packages and deals. Submitted travel packages and deals will be:

• Posted on TraveSalem.com and included in Travel Salem's Quarterly Consumer E-Newsletter, which is distributed to consumers that are interested in keeping up to date on what is happening in the Salem area. (Only applies to businesses that have selected the "Travel Packages" marketing option.)
• Posted to TravelOregon.com where the packages are promoted with Travel Oregon’s seasonal travel campaigns. The upcoming campaign is Oregon Adventurecation focusing on outdoor recreation which will be marketed nation-wide.

We have created an easy to use online

As part of Travel Oregon’s Regional Cooperative Marketing Plan (RCMP), Travel Salem and its regional partners in Yamhill, Clackamas, Linn, Benton and Lane counties are beginning the process of updating the Oregon Wine Country (Willamette Valley) regional plan for FY 12-13.

To review the current plan, go to:

Featuring

Keynote Speaker: Angie Morris, Travel Salem

State of the Industry – Boldly going where no DMO has gone before

March 15, 2012
11:45 a.m. – 1:15 p.m.

Willamette Heritage Center at The Mill
1313 Mill Street SE, Salem

Call 503-581-4325 ext. 58 now to reserve your seat!

Sponsored by:

Travel Salem recently launched a Visitor Intercept Survey that asks visitors a few brief questions about their visit. The findings from the survey will ultimately help guide Travel Salem’s future strategies and assist with return on investment reporting.

All visitors that take the survey will be entered into a prize drawing for a Salem area travel package. All employees asking visitors to complete the survey will also be entered into a prize drawing. Both prize drawings will take place in November 2012. The more surveys turned into Travel Salem, the greater

Travel Salem is working on the 2012-13 Salem Area Visitors Guide and would like to see your photos! If you have high quality (300+ dpi) images they will be considered for inclusion in the new guide as well as TravelSalem.com.

We will consider the following shots within Salem, Marion County and Polk County:

Is Your Web Presence All That It Can Be?

2011 will be remembered as a year of extraordinary achievements by those in Oregon's tourism and hospitality industry. On Sunday, March 18, the best of the industry's best will be saluted by their peers at the 2012 Oregon Governor's Conference on Tourism in Portland.

Everyone works with someone who rises above the challenges of the day to achieve outstanding results. Those folks are deserving of special recognition from their tourism and hospitality industry peers. But it will take YOUR NOMINATION to make that happen!

To view the

The Oregon Destination Marketing Organization (ODMO) is once again presenting its Silent Auction at the Governor’s Conference on Tourism- “Full On Oregon”, March 18-20, 2012, in Portland. This is a great opportunity to showcase your business to almost 400 tourism professionals and with your

Do you have family coming to town for the holidays? Swing by Travel Salem's Travel Cafe Visitors Center (181 High Street NE) to pick up a coupon book of full of deals and special values. Or, click here to view online and print the coupons directly from your computer!

Coupon books are also available for

The Oregon Festivals and Events Association is accepting nominations for its annual Ovation Awards recognizing the “Best” in festivals, fairs and events celebrated in Oregon during 2011.

It’s incredibly easy to nominate your favorite community event. Just go to

Display advertising sales for the Salem Area Visitor Guide have begun. The Salem Area Visitor Guide is the official visitor guide and resource for visitors to the Salem and mid-Willamette Valley. The guide is distributed to 800 locations throughout Oregon, Washington, California and British Columbia and serves as the response piece to all Salem inquiries generated through Travel Salem’s advertising, public relations and consumer engagement strategies.

Businesses interested in

Everybody loves a party! At Travel Salem’s Travel Café we are kicking off the holiday spirit at the December 7th First Wednesday with ideas to help you party your way through 2012. Visitors to the Travel Café will enjoy delicious treats from Trader Joe’s; Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum will be showcasing their museum, IMAX and Wings and Waves Water Park with a special raffle; The Lodge at Detroit Lake is offering holiday special discounts; Chemeketa Center for Business and Industry will be on hand to share all the details regarding their state-of-the- art facility; and Willamette Valley Vineyards will be pouring their spectacular wines.