Nebraska’s message for tourists? ‘It’s not for everyone’

SHARE Nebraska’s message for tourists? ‘It’s not for everyone’
nebraskatourism.jpg

Nebraska’s new sales pitch has a decidedly self-deprecating bent: “Nebraska. Honestly, it’s not for everyone.” | Nebraska Tourism Commission

LINCOLN, Neb. — Nebraska’s no longer nice, at least in its next tourism campaign. The new sales pitch has a decidedly self-deprecating bent: “Nebraska. Honestly, it’s not for everyone.”

The slogan, which the Nebraska Tourism Commission unveiled Wednesday at a Nebraska City conference, will replace the current “Through My Eyes” campaign this spring, commission marketing manager Jenn Gjerde said Thursday.

State tourism director John Ricks told the Omaha World-Herald that because Nebraska consistently ranks as the least likely state tourists plan to visit, the marketing campaign needed to be different.

“To make people listen, you have to hook them somehow,” Ricks said. “We had to shake people up.”

Nebraska has used several slogans in its efforts to entice tourists, including, “America’s Frontier,” ”My Choice, Nebraska” and “Nebraska … the good life.”

The slogan that debuted in 2014 was: “Visit Nebraska. Visit nice.”

One of the new video ads that will begin running next spring opens with a boy peering through oversized glasses into the camera. The background music is quirky.

Then comes a voice: “Nebraska is kind of like that odd kid. Didn’t say much in school. Slightly peculiar maybe. But when you took the time to get to know him, turned out he was pretty interesting.”

Another ad shows two people walking and jumping over the toadstool rock formations at Toadstool Geologic Park in northwestern Nebraska. Words appearing on the photo say: “Famous for our flat, boring landscape.”

Ricks told the Lincoln Journal Star that “the perception of a place to visit in people’s heads is more important than the things to see and do when you get there.”

“Because, if they’re not here, they don’t get to enjoy those things. … So we had to find a way to get people here,” he said.

The Latest
The man was found unresponsive in an alley in the 10700 block of South Lowe Avenue, police said.
The man suffered head trauma and was pronounced dead at University of Chicago Medical Center, police said.
Another federal judge in Chicago who also has dismissed gun cases based on the same Supreme Court ruling says the high court’s decision in what’s known as the Bruen case will “inevitably lead to more gun violence, more dead citizens and more devastated communities.”
Women make up just 10% of those in careers such as green infrastructure and clean and renewable energy, a leader from Openlands writes. Apprenticeships and other training opportunities are some of the ways to get more women into this growing job sector.
Chatterbox doesn’t seem aware that it’s courteous to ask questions, seek others’ opinions.