Visit Santa Barbara Launches New Education Campaign

More than 250 of Santa Barbara’s tourism-minded professionals gathered at the Four Seasons Biltmore last Wednesday for Visit Santa Barbara’s annual meeting, where attendees drew inspiration from marketing guru Sasha Strauss’s engaging speech on effective branding as well as nourishment from the mole chicken and eggplant rish dish. The main course, though, was the tourism bureau’s unveiling of “I Am Santa Barbara,” a new outreach campaign and training program designed to help those who work in the tourism business to be better informed and empowered to spread the Santa Barbara message to all visitors. Starting this summer, Visit Santa Barbara will be offering free but appointment-only 90-minute training sessions, including a bus tour, at the Karpeles Manuscript Museum; the program will also be available to come to headquarters of companies with staffs of more than 40 people as well. See iamsantabarbara.com.