Fountain Hills is a pleasant place to visit, but people don’t necessarily place it on the list of getaway places like Sedona or Flagstaff. Town staffers Rachael Goodwin and Grace Rodman-Guetter would ask simply, why not?

Goodwin and Rodman-Guetter are a dynamic duo at Town Hall whose job it is to get people to think about Fountain Hills when they want to get away from the hustle and bustle of daily life and relax for a weekend or a week.

Goodwin is the town’s recreation and tourism supervisor and Rodman-Guetter the tourism coordinator, and indications are they are finding ways to put the town on the tourism map.

During 2015 Fountain Hills experienced an increase in gross hotel room sales tax of $1.2 million, an 18 percent increase from 2014.

“Get out of the Valley and into the Hills” is the advertising slogan currently being used to brand the community. They want people to experience neighborhood restaurants, hidden adventures small town charm and stunning views.

Those seeking an outdoor adventure have five 18-hole golf courses to choose from in Fountain Hills and Fort McDowell, a world class mountain bike track at nearby McDowell Mountain Park and easy access to more than 100 miles of hiking trails through the surrounding Sonoran Desert.

The arts culture in town features a collection of public art with more than 100 pieces on display around downtown.

The restaurants in town offer good food with ambiance ranging from western steakhouse to Mexican cantina, along with other flavorful cuisine.

Those familiar with Fountain Hills understand the appeal; there is a world of people the town would love to welcome as visitors.

Reaching out

Goodwin and Rodman-Guetter spend much of their time getting the word out using the myriad of tools at their disposal from print advertising to social media and word of mouth.

Between June 2015 and June 2016 Facebook “likes” for the town increased by 14 percent. There were 630,253 impressions made by 386,649 during that time period.

Expansion of website traffic on experiencefountainhills.org is also impressive. From June 2014 to June 2015 there were 23,835 views to the site. From June 2015 to June 2016, after a major overhaul of the site, there were 608,051 page views, an increase of 255 percent. Many of those hits were coming from around the Valley – Phoenix, Scottsdale, Mesa, Tempe and Chandler, but also Los Angeles and New York.

The tourism team has also joined forces with the Chicago Cubs and Spring Training at Sloan Park at Riverview Mesa. The town had a full-page ad in the Spring Training program and Fountain Hills sponsored all home runs for the entire Cubs Spring Training Season.

During October two events highlight activity in Fountain Hills, the Roadrunner Sports Craft Classic half marathon and 5K, a first-time event here, and the CopperWynd Tennis Tournament will be back for a second year.

Staff has pieced together a “perfect day” itinerary for visitors for these events. The material is distributed by event sponsors and hotels hosting guests. It outlines other activities like taking in the art walk, enjoying a dining experience, a hike or other activity while not participating in the greater event.

Showing results

It’s all about showing results, putting together the metrics to show whether an event or activity has any economic benefit to the town. This has always been difficult because of the number of factors involved.

However, for the July 4th celebration this year Goodwin and Rodman-Guetter made an effort to calculate a number for the fiscal benefit of the town.

They used crowd number based on an aggregation of estimates from the Sheriff’s Office and fire department officials, that estimate fell in a range between 8,000 and 10,000. They used survey data collected from more than 300 people in attendance. This information included where they came from, where they heard about the event and how much they spent on food, etc.

They calculated gross revenue of about $132,000, which translates to a sales tax collection of around $30,000.

Admittedly the process needs refinement, Goodwin said, but they will continue to use the system for events where they have a presence and can practically survey attendees.

The two large craft fairs are not good events to survey attendees, however, as the town receives more definitive revenue numbers from these events based on sales tax collected.

The council adopted a Tourism Strategic Plan presented by Goodwin and Rodman-Guetter and emphatically praised them for their efforts is developing the plan and organizing and staging events.