(Seguin) – The city’s Seguin Squirrel Trail program is now officially an award-winning Squirrel Trail program.
Visit Seguin, the city’s official convention & visitors bureau, is proud to announce that it has been honored with three prestigious awards from the Texas Association of Convention and Visitor Bureaus (TACVB) Destination Excellence Awards.
Included in that list are two awards recognizing the ongoing success of the city’s Squirrel Trail Program, which promotes art in public places. The fiberglass squirrel statues, independently sponsored by local groups and individuals, are painted and then placed in public areas throughout the community.
The Seguin CVB also walked away with a third Destination Award, earning the People’s Choice for Website Design and Effectiveness.
Blair Friar, Seguin Main Street & CVB assistant director, says the scope of these awards are based on outstanding achievements in destination marketing and management.
“There’s the Peer Recognition which is voted again on by our peers and the Convention & Visitors Bureau community across Texas and that is by budget categories and then the Judges’ Choice is among all entries so no matter what budget category your CVB falls under, the judge’s pick their favorite out of all those submissions. So, yes, when you get picked in that section, it definitely brings us the excitement because you are competing against very large destinations and it’s just exciting to say that our program was selected,” said Friar.
Friar says the city is especially excited that its Squirrel Trail program is getting the recognition it deserves by receiving both the People’s Choice for Community/Local Engagement and Judges Choice for Community/Local Engagement Campaign awards. She says it validates the project’s impact and creativity in the Seguin community.
“Because it is a statewide award entry process, to be able to submit it and get the award, it was very exciting. We are excited and proud to submit it of course but then when you are able to get it as a peer recognition as well as Judge’s Choice for that Squirrel Trail Award that kind of suits us up a little bit and kind of amps the whole squirrel program.
We are really proud of all three awards but that one really has been a labor of love and a really fun project to see come to fruition,” said Friar.
Friar says the awards recognize not only the idea for the squirrel trail program but also its implementation in attracting visitors.
“It’s based on special events that we are really trying to get the community behind and get that backing. In our submission, we included the success of the project, the number of sponsors that we have received, the number of squirrels in production as well as results from – the maps that are getting picked up daily in the visitor’s center. We have an online stop by stop map that you can take to go on the squirrel trail that we can track how many people have used. We were able to submit some real good numbers on the usage and the adoption of this program from the local community because that is what really shows that it was a great program,” said Friar.
Like the squirrel program, Friar says its third award also solidifies the city’s new award-winning website – a novelty for any community in the state tourism industry.
“We launched our new website last year and we have really been able to see a jump in web traffic and just the general usage and ease of use, honestly of the website. That is kind of what was judged of how user friendly it was as well as what our actual numbers look like as far as people who are visiting our site and using it. So, we were really excited to be able to put that in for consideration this year because it was a very exciting project for us and then to be able to be selected. Again, this was in our budget category which kind of evens out the playing field. We are able to compete against people who are at our level because we can’t obviously afford the websites of some really large destinations but to be able to say we have an award-winning website is also very exciting because we worked really hard on it and it’s been nice to see it all come out,” said Friar.
The state organization’s Destination Excellence Awards are said to help celebrate the outstanding work of destination management organizations across Texas. The TACVB presented Seguin with its awards last month in Austin.