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March 21, 2019
Tourism Grants awarded to the PPTF for 2019
Tourism Grants
Tourism grants aren't easy to come by. However, Lythos Studios has successfully written another Virginia Tourism Corporation (VTC) marketing leverage grant for the Petersburg Preservation Task Force (PPTF) for 2019.
Results for marketing campaigns can be measured in many ways; through Google Analytics, Facebook Analytics, Instagram Followers, etc. Ultimately though, sales or attendance if you're a tourist destination judges the strength of the messaging.
The PPTF realized a 76% increase in attendance at its three museums in 2018 vs 2017. The driver of the increase was the creative messaging. Across the United States, attendance at civil war museums and parks has decreased over the past years. Blandford Church has 15 Louis Comfort Tiffany stained glass windows each representing a different state in the Confederacy. The marketing campaign directed attention away from civil war history and focused on the art of the stained glass windows. Blandford Church can not hide from its history, nor should it. However, Tiffany is known around the world for his stained glass windows in churches in many cities and states.
Lythos Studios uses the methodology of discover, create, implement and measure. Over the past two years, this methodology has proven to be effective and has resulted in the second of the tourism grants awarded by VTC.
To learn more, visit other buzz posts or case studies at
For more detail about this project and tourism grants, click on the following link:
Success Story
Great creative coupled with technical savvy has proven to be a great success story. Results of the Virginia Tourism Corporation (VTC) campaign for the Petersburg Preservation Task Force (PPTF) are as follows with the comparison of 2017 vs 2018. This campaign has reached hundreds of thousands of viewers via television, radio, print and digital means.
Visitation percentage increase month/month and year to year:
Month 2017 vs 2018
April -12% (Campaign start dates covered the entire month of April)
May +27%
June +24%
July +94%
August +164%
September +208%
Although the bulk of the grant monies was spent between April and June, the campaign was extended through the end of the year with maintaining radio and digital presence. Focusing the marketing efforts on the Tiffany windows at Blandford Church and a target audience that would find the Tiffany collection fascinating proved to be a success story. The campaign details can be viewed on the PPTF Facebook page at
https://www.facebook.com/petersburgpreservationtaskforce
or visit the PPTF website at https://petersburgpreservationtaskforce.com
St. John Tiffany Window
August 2018
Petersburg Preservation Task Force Tiffany Window Marketing Campaign Success
Tiffany Window
In the fall of 2017, the Petersburg Preservation Task Force (PPTF), met with a group of Virginia Tourism Corporation (VTC) directors, managers and staff members to provide a tour to various venues in Old Towne Petersburg. The tour started at historic Blandford Church, home of 15 Tiffany windows, then moved to Centre Hill Museum, broke for lunch, then picked up again at the Southside Depot, Appomattox Iron Works, with a end of day recap at the Jury's Inn. The goal was to provide VTC with a tour that any tourist would experience. This tour was in preparation for writing a marketing grant funded by VTC titled the Marketing Leverage Program. The MLP allows for a group such as the PPTF to include the marketing money its tourism partners spend within the same calendar year. Thus, the PPTF was allowed to include money spent by the City of Petersburg, Petersburg Area Regional Tourism (PART), and the Jury's Inn. The maximum amount of the grant is $50,000. PPTF applied in October, 2017 and was awarded the grant in March 2018. It was the first time the PPTF secured a grant dedicated to marketing tourism since its inception in 2016. The PPTF has a memorandum of understanding with the City of Petersburg to operate the museums and market them. The document is reviewed annually and has up to five more years to conduct museum business.
Lythos Studios was retained by the PPTF to create a marketing plan for 2018. The team we created consisted of Leslie Strickler of Etre Communications, who was Hamner's PR partner when working with the City of Petersburg from November 2016 through September 2017. Darrell Cahoon is the graphic designer, and various media outlets have been employed to deliver the campaign message, "Living Color: Tiffany Window Treasures of Petersburg".
St. John Tiffany Window
The campaign consists of marketing to day trippers within a 75-100 mile radius of Petersburg. The Tiffany Window campaign is employing television, radio, digital (Facebook, Youtube and Google), and some print. Instead of focusing on Civil War history, the campaign is focused on the artwork housed at historic Blandford Church, the home of 15 Tiffany Windows. The first of the television advertisements can be seen at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sa-5HX6SIUs&t=60s
Additional television spots appear on CBS6 during the 5:30a Sunrise sponsorship.
This grant was made possible by Virginia Tourism Corporation. #loveva
Virginia.org