St. Paul ramps up efforts
to attract visitors

Jake Spitzack
Staff Writer

St. Paul has been jam-packed with attractions so far this year. In February, Red Bull snowboarders shredded at the State Capitol. Two months later, fans of the NCAA Frozen Four hockey tournament filled the Xcel Energy Center, and this summer patios across the city have seen an influx of new customers.

This renewed vibrancy is thanks in part to the work of Visit St. Paul, the city’s official convention and visitor bureau. However, there is much work still to be done to rebound from the devastating effects of closures due to the pandemic. While the city’s hotel occupancy was up slightly last year over the previous year, for example, it is hovering around 50% occupancy, which is down 18% from pre-pandemic numbers.

The staff of Visit St. Paul has adjusted to the times and is constantly seeking creative ways to promote St. Paul’s amenities and attract marquee events, said the organization’s president and CEO Jaimee Lucke Hendrickson.

“We kicked off the year being able to announce the 2026 World Juniors [international hockey tournament] coming to St. Paul,” she said. “That is really going to put the spotlight on the city. Ten teams will be here for ten days from across the world, and in many areas of the hockey world it’s like Super Bowl viewership. There’s lots of excitement around it.” The event will be held in late December 2025 through early January 2026 at the Xcel Energy Center. Many teams will arrive a week or two beforehand to practice and acclimate to the time change. Several practice sites will be designated across the state.

Visit St. Paul has shifted some of its marketing efforts to folks who live here, encouraging them to head downtown for a fun date night or exciting weekend. A summer campaign called “The Fun Side” will wrap up at the end of August but there’s still time to get a taste of its main attraction, the patio passport, in its second season and running through Labor Day. Folks can register a “patio passport” on their phone and be guided to 20 restaurant patios. Each patio visit earns points that are redeemable for prizes including clothing and home décor, and all participants have a chance to win the grand prize: a St. Paul Weekend Getaway featuring a hotel stay, tickets to an event and a restaurant gift card. Those who visit all the patios get a fanny pack and will be added to the Patio Pro Wall of Fame, which is expected to go live on the Visit St. Paul’s website in the coming months. Last year more than 1,800 people participated in the campaign.

The Fun Side campaign includes digital billboard ads promoting St. Paul in Duluth, Chicago, Fargo, Des Moines and other cities. It’s supplemented by the Downtown Alliance’s ongoing “Your Place” social media campaign, which launched last year in partnership with Visit St. Paul. This effort features four short videos highlighting themed itineraries of the city: foodie, sports fan, family fun and outdoor fun. According to Visit St. Paul’s 2023 annual report, ads in last year’s summer campaign had more than 4.1 million impressions.

“Our mission is to promote St. Paul in order to bring people here and have a positive impact for all of us that live and work and have businesses here,” said Hendrickson. “It’s important for us to be able to bring together community and businesses for a shared goal of creating a really great experience for people when they come to our city.”

One of the main priorities is promoting upcoming fairs and festivals such as the Little Africa Fest, IndiaFest and Irish Fair, all held in August. Last year Visit St. Paul launched an event marketing program that provided 20 events in the city with free advertising on its website, newsletters and social media. It also promoted the events on radio and digital billboards in the metro area, and provided professional photography at each event so organizers can use the photos in future marketing efforts. Among the events highlighted last year were the Japanese Obon Festival, West 7th SummerFest and Deutsche Tage.

“We’ve seen it for years that festivals and events have seen increased challenges with changes in sponsorship and changes in expenses, and it gets more and more challenging to pull those off, especially free events for the community to attend,” said Hendrickson. “We knew that we wanted to do something to support the success of those beloved events in the city and we really evaluated what resources we had…. Rather than sponsorship checks, we allocate marketing assets with the goal of making more people aware of these events and when they’re happening and how to experience them to hopefully drive up attendance to support them in that way.”

This winter, the “St. Paulidays” campaign will once again promote ways to enjoy our iconically wintry city.

Visit St. Paul’s efforts to get the word out about the city appear to be working. Its website hits increased 20% over last year to more than 1.7 million views, and subscribers to its email newsletters are up 26% from last year, to 24,588. Its annual budget comes primarily from the lodging tax collected by the city through hotel stays. The 2024 budget is $3.54 million, a 2% increase from 2023.

Hendrickson joined the team in 2013 and took on the leadership role just shy of a year ago. She noted that Visit St. Paul works very closely with Meet Minneapolis, the visitor’s bureau for Minneapolis, and that each city has its own unique character and offerings. Among St. Paul’s top-notch attractions are its zoo and museums, plethora of sporting events, historic sights and architecture, and the most miles of Mississippi riverfront of any city in the country.

“I’m really excited, too, about the work the city’s done to start to look at the river as a focus,” said Hendrickson, referring to the proposed River Balcony project that is now in the planning stage. “Global is local in St. Paul. There’s a multitude of cultural experiences you can have in our cultural destination areas, and I think that’s the icing on the cake for the city and the experience you can have here.”

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