It’s time to get your passport and get going.
The third annual GO! Passport Program begins Wednesday and will run through Aug. 31.
Sponsored by the Grand Island of Commerce, The GO! Passport Program encourages individuals to visit 10 Grand Island businesses over the summer There they will get a stamp on their passport card. They can also virtually collect a stamp on the Grand Island VIBE app.
If all 10 businesses are visited, the passport recipient will receive a goody bag of prizes, in addition to being entered to win the grand prizes.
Businesses selected to be stops for the 2022 GO! Passport Program are: Ashley Home Store, Big Red Treats, Boutique 29Eleven, Grand Island Tourism, Jackrabbit Run Golf Course, Ken’s Appliances, Nielsen’s Processing, Rejuvenation Salon, Sayler Screenprinting and Stuhr Museum Bistro.
Passport cards are available at the selected businesses, Chamber of Commerce, and Grand Island Tourism office. The GO! Passport Program is a cooperative effort between Grow Grand Island and the chamber.
History of the GO! Passport
“The chamber has always had supporting local businesses near the top of the priority list, and it was in recent years that we started looking for new innovative ways to bring attention to our local businesses,” said Karissa Schmidt, who coordinates the program for the chamber. She is the chamber’s communication and events coordinator.
Schmidt said with all the technology and online opportunities, it can be easy to go purchase something online. But she said you make such a bigger impact by choosing to support a local business instead.
Thanks to some grant funding opportunities through Grow Grand Island, Schmidt said the chamber launched an initiative in 2019 to create a brand focused on supporting local businesses.
“The goal of this initiative is to bring awareness of the impact consumers can make by choosing to spend their money within the community,” she said.
Schmidt said that after some planning and strategizing, the messaging campaign “Look Local Grow Local” was born.
“Look Local Grow Local,” or “Look Local” for short, is a multifaceted initiative that includes a variety of concepts including: branded decals on the windows of businesses, a Facebook page dedicated to shop local awareness, banners on the light poles around town, and the Grand Island Shops page where Facebook users can post about deals going on in the community.
Schmidt said the idea around the passport program is similar format to the Nebraska Passport, but on a much smaller scale and focused on the Grand Island area.
“The passport features 10 different local businesses or organizations in the hopes of increasing sales and awareness,” she said.
How to participate
Schmidt said there are two different ways to participate in the passport.
The first is the traditional passport booklet that can be found at any of the 10 stops, and at the Grand Island Chamber of Commerce office.
The other option is to collect stamps digitally by downloading the Grand Island Vibe app, which can be found in both the Apple and Google Play stores.
“The app utilizes geolocation on your phone so as you arrive at the business, the app will allow you to press a button to virtually collect the stamp on your phone,” Schmidt said.
She said regardless of which method of stamp collecting you go with, the passport program is 100% free to participate.
“While we encourage you to support the local business financially by purchasing something, you are not required to make a purchase in order to collect a stamp,” Schmidt said.
What they hope for in 2022
Schmidt said in the first year of the passport, they we were still figuring things out.
“It didn’t help that we had planned to launch the passport in 2020 and as we were launching, the COVID-19 pandemic became prevalent in our community,” Schmidt said.
But despite this obstacle, she said they still had good response from community members who wanted to show their support for local businesses.
“Last year, our second year of the passport, we updated the design of the passport booklet and also added the option to collect stamps digitally through a great partnership with the Grand Island Convention and Visitors Bureau,” Schmidt said.
Dana Jelinek with the CVB said the passport program is a great opportunity to tell the community and visitors to the community about “things that they don’t know about, or maybe they’ve forgotten.”
“Passports are great in that they open people’s eyes,” Jelinek said. “Whether it’s a retail establishment or food, maybe they’ve seen it and not gone to it. This (passport program) that can get them motivated to finally take that step to go someplace or in the doors of a new place.”
Schmidt said they worked with their team to get the GO! Passport on the Grand Island Vibe app so they could provide a contactless way for participants to still collect stamps.
She said their goal in each year of the passport was for participants to complete their passport booklet and bring awareness to the 10 passport stops.
“The last two years, we saw a number of people participating — many turning it into a family event or a fun summer challenge,” Schmidt said.
She said they also saw several out-of-town visitors from across the country who were visiting family or were here for a trip and they visited all 10 stops during their short stay.
“Whether the stops are a business that you visit frequently, or it is somewhere entirely new, the passport program’s purpose is to expose the community to our local businesses and the encourage a shop local mindset,” Schmidt said.
Looking at a busy summer
Grand Island has a full slate of activities planned this summer
The kickoff the GO! Passport Program is also the beginning of a summer of events that will draw hundreds of thousands of people to Grand Island.
“We received such a positive response from the digital version that we plan to continue having it as an option this year,” Schmidt said.
“Events held in Grand Island help drive the food service and hospitality,” said Cindy Johnson, president of the Grand Island Chamber of Commerce.
For example, Johnson said when there’s a baseball or softball tournament at one of Grand Island’s ballparks, “the teams and their supporters will be in Grand Island for a day, or even several days. Those teams visit our local stores, restaurants and even stay at our local hotels.”
She said other additional multi-day events like the Nebraska Fire School, Nebraska State Fair, GILCA, among many others bring outside visitors to town.
In June, among the many events happening in Grand Island.
• The Nebraska Truck Championships at Fonner Park on June 2-4.
• The Fourth Street Festival on June 4-5
• Hear Grand Island summer concert series starts June 3 the Railside District
• American Boer Goat National Show from June 10-18 at Fonner Park
• American Charolais Association Show from June 19-24 at Fonner Park
• ZZ Top will perform at the heartland events Center on June 22.
• National 4-H Shooting Sports Championship will run June 26-July 1
“Our city has specifically chosen to market our facilities to junior and national shows because of their extended length,” Johnson said. “These groups are more likely to utilize hotels for accommodation, and spend time visiting local businesses and restaurants.”
She said this contributes to revenue in the hotel industry, and results in increase in sales tax and food and beverage tax.
“Grand Island is fortunate to have these excellent facilities so we can draw national competitions and be the host city for numerous events throughout the year,” Johnson said.
She said Grand Island has a piece of youth sporting events revenue that is crucial to the economic success of the community.
In addition to the livestock shows and sports competitions, Johnson said the Nebraska State Fair and Husker Harvest Days, Aksarben Stock Show and Harvest of Harmony are other big events in Grand Island planned for late summer and early fall.
