the cvb exec

Kelly Schultz

Dat Tuesday
Spring 2010

KELLY SCHULZ is vice president, communications and public relations for the New Orleans Metropolitan Convention & Visitors Bureau. MPG* spoke with Kelly following the New Orleans Saints victory at Super Bowl XLIV.

MPG: Everybody’s asking --“Who dat?”
Kelly: Today in New Orleans the universal greeting is not “hi” or “hello,” it’s “Who dat?” It’s a grammatically incorrect way of saying, “who is it that thinks they are going to beat the Saints?” It was first used in the ’60s by St. Augustine High School in New Orleans. The Saints fans adopted it in 1983.

When the Saints had their victory parade, there were an estimated 800,000 people who came out to watch the Mardi Gras-style parade. Mardi Gras means “Fat Tuesday.” That day was “Dat Tuesday.”

Help us understand how a destination can use effective public relations or a successful event to help rebuild a damaged brand.
One of the best parts of the Super Bowl has been the overwhelming, positive global media coverage about New Orleans.

From a PR standpoint, one of the most difficult things for us over the past five years has been overcoming the visual images that were seared in everyone’s minds during Hurricane Katrina. People being rescued from rooftops, homes underwater, and the chaos in the city provided powerful, disturbing and lasting images. From a media perspective, the Saints victory has been just the opposite. It shows that New Orleans is alive and full of joy and jubilation.

We’ve been trying to rebrand our city for four years and get out a positive message about the return of conventions, the record breaking attendance at our festivals, our improving tourism industry and a visitor experience that is better than it has ever been. We’ve worked hard to overcome those Katrina images and the media coverage of the Saints has been so helpful - it’s been a great story.

In addition to being talented athletes, the Saints are really good guys and give back to the community. Drew Brees has a foundation that has done so many wonderful things.

Give us an example of how to use PR to help promote an event.
We did a lot of PR around how to have a Super Bowl party, New Orleans-style. We sent out press releases from all of our famous chefs. We talked about our unique culture and how people could celebrate in a New Orleans way. We heard from people all over the country who said they were rooting for us. Unless you lived in Indiana, you were rooting for the New Orleans Saints.

It doesn’t matter what kind of neighborhood you live in, the color of your skin, what you do for a living, the New Orleans Saints are something that every single person in this
city has rallied around. Our visitors feel that – they feel the vitality in this community.

How are you using social networking tools in your PR efforts?
We have a presence on Twitter and Facebook. Our Facebook fan page is called “Forever New Orleans,” and over the past couple of weeks we’ve tripled our fan base. We were recently named one of the “Tweet Elite” from DCI - they found us to be one of the top 5 bureaus in the country. Social media is changing so fast - it’s a real challenge to stay ahead.

Give us an update on some of the other great things happening in New Orleans.
We are thrilled with Mayor-Elect Mitch Landrieu. Serving as our Lt. Governor, his job was tourism for the state. He completely understands tourism. Meeting planners should recognize that he is going to be an asset to every person who does business here.

Major conventions are returning to New Orleans. In 2009, we hosted Microsoft, the National Automobile Dealers Association, the American Society of Hematology and several other major organizations. The Evangelical Lutheran Church of America had 37,000 people come to New Orleans and they are looking at coming back.

In an effort to boost their attendance, our bureau works hard to help planners promote their meetings and the city. We have a full time position - director of group communications - whose sole job is to work with groups and their marketing teams to build attendance. We take what we know about New Orleans and what they know about their attendees and marry the two into a customized marketing plan for their meeting.

We’ve had the opening of new hotels and attractions. The historic Roosevelt Hotel, which opened originally in 1890, reopened last year after a $170 million restoration. It’s a fabulous hotel and part of the Waldorf-Astoria brand.

The National World War II Museum is going through a multi-million dollar expansion. Last November, its Victory Theater opened featuring a film narrated by Tom Hanks, a new restaurant by Chef John Besh, and the Stage Door Canteen. It’s a great venue for meetings. They do a musical performances like the ones during World War II.

Despite the tough economy, all of our festivals - Jazz Festival, French Quarter Festival, Mardi Gras, etc.- are experiencing strong, in some cases record breaking, attendance.

What’s in the future for New Orleans?
Through the efforts of Lt. Governor Landrieu and other New Orleans’ hospitality leaders, we have recently launched a strategic tourism plan that sets out to determine where we want to be as a destination in 2018, the city’s 300th anniversary. Plans include the redevelopment of the Riverfront, upgrading Canal Street, and enhancements to the French Quarter and to the airport. New Orleans currently hosts about 7 million visitors per year. The goal is to have 13.7 million visitors by 2018. This would create 33,000 new hospitality jobs.

Our future has never been brighter. Although is was a horrible tragedy, Katrina provided an opportunity for us to take everything that was broken and fix it. We
are hosting Super Bowl XLVII in 2013. We now have one of the best charter school systems in the country. Our government is more efficient, our hospitals are better and the city is attracting young, bright entrepreneurs. No one could have imagined that we would have come this far in five years.  

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