Representatives from the Haines Borough and its tourism industry say they are confident their pitch of reduced docking fees influenced cruise line officials during recent visits with them in Miami and Seattle.
Mayor Jan Hill, tourism director Leslie Ross and Alaska Mountain Guides owner Sean Gaffney met with representatives from Holland America Line, Seabourn Cruise Line and Princess Cruises in Seattle before moving on to Miami, where they visited the offices of Silversea Cruises, Royal Caribbean Cruises and Norwegian Cruise Line.
Ross said she is “pretty confident” the borough’s 50-percent off deal on dockings will bear fruit in the form of new ships or increased visits in 2017. (The assembly in June agreed to waive 50 percent of docking fees for every new and existing cruise ship that visits the Port Chilkoot Dock during the 2017-2019 seasons.)
“I walked away from each company having a good feeling about the interaction and their response to what we presented,” Ross said.
Gaffney said he also believes “there’s a good chance” of the fee waivers resulting in more ships.
“There’s no question that the waiver had a lot of impact,” Gaffney said. “We’re not going to know for a little bit of time. I think we will see one set of results in 2017 and we are likely to see additional results in 2018 and 2019.”
Ross said she hasn’t received any commitments from cruise lines yet, but the companies are set to release their 2017 schedules in the next two months.
The fee waiver also created an opportunity to talk about cruise ships visiting Haines and Skagway as a dual port, which some ships have done in the past. The ships would visit Skagway in the morning and Haines in the evening, but would only have to pay fees in one town, Ross said.
Ross and Chamber of Commerce executive director Debra Schnabel also brainstormed on a modern tagline to sell Haines and decided on “Where adventure is an art, and art is an adventure.”
“I think a huge part of promoting Haines is our people and our art and our creativity,” Ross said. “Haines gets a reputation as not a place to shop and my point has been there are plenty of places to shop. There are many crafts and craftsmen.”
Ross said she also emphasized infrastructure improvements at the Port Chilkoot Dock, as well as the town’s downtown revitalization efforts, the Haines Brewing Company’s movement to Main Street and the award-winning Port Chilkoot Distillery.