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Smallwander.com gathers small town cultural
resources into a single database. Benefits
include the following:
For travelers:
-
A
collection of small towns that don't look like
every other place in America.
-
Ability to search calendar of events,
attractions, restaurants, shopping, and lodging.
For
merchants/cultural organizations:
-
Incentives for travelers seeking small town
experiences to visit participating merchants.
-
Increased publicity in media that value cultural
tourism.
For towns:
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Ability to attract travelers from atypical
regions (such as across state lines).
-
A
forum to share information and plan events among
member towns.
-
A
piece of the cultural tourism pie, the fastest
growing segment of the tourism industry.
I
learned how the arts benefit tourism and contribute
to a town's economic vitality during my time as a
volunteer for the Hillsborough Arts Council in
Hillsborough, NC.
I
made some short day-trips to nearby small towns to
see what they were doing to attract visitors.
I came away amazed at the large number of interesting
things that were going on in each of the towns.
However, even though the towns I visited were within
a 70 mile-driving radius of Hillsborough, I hadn't
heard a word about their great events and
attractions because they were outside of publicity
range.
Smallwander.com arose from the desire to help
travelers find out about all the great things that
are happening in nearby small towns. I also
wanted to help small towns to work together to
network and share information to plan new and unique
events across regions. In today's age, that
means forming an interactive website, which would
provide detailed information on where to go, what to
do, and when to do it. Although travel
directories exist, not many are database driven,
many don't break across regions, such as state
lines, and few focus on the small-town experience.
In
summary, Smallwander.com promotes tourism to
small towns by:
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Promoting only those small towns that recognize
the value of cultural tourism.
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Providing up-to-date, quality information for
travelers seeking "Small Town Experiences."
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Facilitating the flow of travelers among
like-minded small towns.
I
hope you enjoy these great small towns!
John Delconte
Hillsborough, NC
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