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Oregon touts its outdoor options From staff and wire reports The outdoor adventure pitch is pretty hard to miss in advertising these days. Auto manufacturers who want to be your "outfitter" are loading sport utility vehicles with gadgets geared at outdoor enthusiasts. Actors brag about home fitness equipment gathering dust while they traverse the rugged backcountry. Commercials are loaded with bikers, kayakers, runners and other outdoor busybodies. Add Oregon's tourism boosters to the list of those pushing a more active and outdoor lifestyle. The Oregon Tourism Commission's latest campaign to get visitors to stay longer and spend more is heavy on outdoor activities. "What's very specific about the campaign is a very deliberate focus on natural beauty and outdoor adventure," says Todd Davidson, the commission's executive director. "That's the primary draw. We wanted to make sure we played that up." Glimpses of the new strategy already have cropped up in the commission's 2000 travel guide. The traditional coastal picture of tide pools now features children exploring the tide pools. Even the governor has been recruited. Rather than the usual welcome letter from Gov. John Kitzhaber, the 2000 edition includes a picture of him -- in his hip waders -- fly-fishing in the North Santiam River. The campaign features Oregon families enjoying the outdoors, from playing on the beaches to rafting on the Rogue River. It marks a subtle but important shift, Davidson says. Recent efforts have touted Oregon's scenery but haven't played up the diverse activities available. The refined pitch: Oregon's more than a pretty place to pass through. It's a pretty place with plenty of activities to fill a full vacation. "People knew Oregon was very beautiful," says Davidson. "They just didn't know what they could do here." Davidson is in Medford today as a keynote speaker at the Southern Oregon Visitors Association's fourth annual tourism symposium. The event begins at 10 a.m. at the Red Lion Hotel in Medford. The public is welcome, though there is $49 admission charge that includes materials, refreshments and lunch. The symposium includes a host of other tourism experts and Davidson's presentation will focus more on continued regional cooperation in tourism than on the new ad campaign, which debuts in late February. But the campaign's goal -- to present Oregon as a vacation destination rather than a stop -- is shared by Southern Oregon tourism boosters. SOVA -- a six-county tourism marketing effort -- takes the approach that the way to boost tourism in this region isn't to promote one activity or one place, according to SOVA marketing consultant Mark Dennett. "Nobody is going to come to this area to see one thing," he says. "The primary message is that Southern Oregon should be your vacation destination." The idea is to present the area as a collection of activities and places to visit. The one-stop approach is similar to the theme embraced by Medford's Visitor and Convention Bureau. It's newest slogan, "Medford: The Center of It All," is designed to promote the city as the launching point for everything from trips to Crater Lake to visits to Ashland and Jacksonville. "We have all these attractions within a short distance," says Julie Petretto, the bureau's director. State and local officials see longer stays as a way to increase the number of tourism dollars without causing crowding issues. "Our goal is to get people to stay longer and spend more," says Davidson. "Not more people, more dollars." Tourism has been a booming industry in Oregon in recent years. The state registered $5.2 billion in visitor spending during 1998, up 44 percent since 1991. Still, other states have been growing faster. A 1998 study showed Oregon was losing market share to Washington, California and British Columbia at a time when the overall market has been expanding. Today's Edition : News | Sports | Business | Weather | Tempo | Classifieds Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA