A COMMUNITY CALENDAR LIFTS ENGAGEMENT

Explore Holyoke has launched its new website – designed to be a community tool for events and activities around the city.

The launch came ahead of the city’s “Explore Holyoke Restaurant Week”.

Quotable. “The impetus for the Explore Holyoke website was definitely to have a tool that the community could use to have events on a community calendar but also have a direct listing for restaurants and retailers within the city of Holyoke,” said Aaron Vega, director of the city’s Office of Planning and Economic Development. “We were able to kind of speed it along because we knew we had restaurant week coming up.”

A community website. The website allows local businesses to submit their events in a simple-to-use format.

As part of the restaurant week, participants will be able to track their “food journey” with stamps in a “food passport” that afterward can be used as coupons at those same restaurants.

There will also be four food demonstrations and tastings at Holyoke Community College’s MGM Culinary Arts Institute.

We love this simple and printable food passport from the DMO, but must really show appreciation for implementing an easy to use tool that allows stakeholders to publish events to a community calendar.

While no platform is perfect, the DMO is winning in its effort to engage the community and to be a resource for them as they recover from the pandemic.