A $2,500 Virginia Tourism Corporation Marketing Leveraging Grant was awarded to the Town of Farmville for The Heart of Your Adventure (THOYA) marketing consortium. According to Magi Van Eps, Prince Edward County tourism coordinator, the name of the grant is “Find It In Farmville, Phase II.”

THOYA is made up of The Town of Farmville, Prince Edward County, Farmville Downtown Partnership and the Farmville Area Chamber of Commerce. Van Eps said the Town and the County have been working together promoting tourism in the area since 2007.

“In Phase I, The Heart of Your Adventure produced four 30-second commercial spots, called Find It In Farmville, promoting our History and Heritage, Shopping and Dining, Outdoor Adventure, and an Overview to how visitors can truly Find It In Farmville,” Van Eps said. “That grant also allowed us to purchase 21 days of airtime via Comcast Spotlight last Fall. We chose to spotlight the overview video along with the ‘Shop and Dine’ video.”

She said the commercials aired on 27 cable channels for a total of 592 times in Charlottesville, Fredericksburg, Washington D.C. and Richmond, as well as in the Farmville market which allowed citizens to see how “hard we work at promoting this community.”

“We saw a very positive increase in virtual visits to our YouTube site, along with increases in the social media through the VisitFarvmille.com, The Town of Farmville and the Chamber’s Facebook accounts,” Van Eps said.

She said with the new grant award for Phase II, and because the videos are still fresh, the Heart of Your Adventure can focus most of this funding toward Comcast Spotlight for a more aggressive spring campaign driving visitors to the Farmville community.

“Prince Edward County is also a principal member in another tourism marketing consortium. Virginia’s Crossroads, formerly Virginia’s Retreat, has been promoting tourism in the Central and Southern Virginia communities since 1993,” Van Eps said. “A $20,000 award from Virginia Tourism Corporation Marketing Leverage Grant was announced for ‘Virginia’s Crossroads — Find Your Path!’ Multi-phase marketing of the eleven communities, Virginia State Parks and Appomattox Court House National Park is planned, intended to drive visitors to our region.”

She said with many of the top visitation spots in the region in Prince Edward County, Farmville is likely to see increased visitation due to this campaign as well.

“Some of what the funds will be spent on includes developing a targeted marketing campaign designed to direct visitors to our region for Lee’s Retreat and the Wilson-Kautz Raid Trails, The Civil Rights in Education Heritage Trail ®, the multitude of outdoor amenities, including nine state parks, along with the wonderful opportunities to shop, dine and relax in some of the most unique locations around Virginia,” Van Eps said.