Creating a Pass Around the Unique Thing That Defines Your Destination

Visitors come to your area to experience what makes it distinct. With the ability to build unlimited passes, you can now easily build multiple experiences that cater to a variety of  audiences (even dogs.) You can also design a pass around one signature food or beverage, or explore other fun, niche ideas – without feeling pressure to include every business on a single pass.

Below are examples from Bandwango partners that have embraced the unique features that define their destinations. Each has created an exclusive check-in challenge for visitors, and several have prizes perfectly aligned to the theme. Some have even used these experiences as unique story angles to pitch to journalists and earn media coverage. Take a look at some of the standout ideas below – and start thinking about what makes YOUR destination special.

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Embrace the mythical creatures that call your destination home 

In Weeki Wachee, you can see real mermaids perform underwater at Weeki Wachee Springs State Park. Florida’s Adventure Coast Visitors Bureau turned this beloved attraction into a wider exploration of the area with The Mermaid Tale Trail – an interactive check-in challenge that leads visitors to more than 30 mermaid statues across the region. The family-friendly experience includes mermaid-themed prizes like temporary tattoos, coloring books, and mermaid tail keychains.

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Create an audio tour to promote a celebrity tie-in from your region 

Augusta, Georgia embraces their musical claim-to-fame, James Brown, and Visit Augusta has created a self-guided experience called The James Brown Journey that allows visitors to have an in-depth look at some of the areas that were significant in his life. Each stop has a well-written description, but they’re also making use of Bandwango’s new features and have included audio for passholders to hear at each stop, too – giving an even deeper look into the life of this soulful artist. For example, when passholders stop at his former church, they are able to play an audio clip recorded by his pastor.  

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You can create a celebrity-based pass even if that celebrity isn’t human 

Sometimes the town celebrity isn’t a human, but that’s ok. Who doesn’t love a lasagna-eating cat?  The Garfield Trail thoroughly embraces Muncie, Indiana’s ties to this fat cat, as his creator, Jim Davis, graduated from there and kept the Garfield headquarters there for many years. Passholders use this pass as a way to guide them to the 16 Garfield statues throughout the area – each unique in its own way. One of the statues is at Destination Muncie’s visitor center, so this is also used as an incentive to get visitors there. At each statue, passholders can check in, earn points, and then redeem those for chances to win one of the multiple Garfield gift baskets.  

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Has your destination gained notoriety for something new that is luring new visitors to town?

For racing enthusiasts and nature-lovers, Sebring, Florida has been a popular spot for years, but they’ve also recently become a household name for HGTV fans since their downtown was chosen to be featured on the show “Home Town Takeover.” The show’s hosts came to the town and renovated many areas – and through the show, introduced the destination to a whole new audience. This has brought new visitors in, and Visit Sebring created an HGTV Downtown Sebring Home Town Takeover Tour pass that serves as a self-guided tour for fans of the show. They are able to visit locations that appeared on Home Town Takeover, and each stop on the tour has information about the renovations that took place at that particular spot.   

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Is there a popular food item that defines your destination? 

‍Food-based passes are popular, but some of our most successful passes have been focused on one very specific food that defines a destination. For example, Manitoba wanted to showcase their Ukrainian culture through food, and used the Manitoba Perogy Trail as a way to do that. There are over 56 places where visitors can explore the region’s culinary delicacy, and this check-in challenge guides them throughout their tasting journey. Travel Manitoba also has a sponsor of this pass, and utilizes the ad space within the pass to showcase the sponsor with a banner ad. In addition, they used this as a way to give back. Keeping with the Ukrainian theme, the destination did something pretty cool to celebrate their 1,000th check in. They, along with their sponsor, Perogy Planet, presented a $5,000 check to Oseredok Ukrainian Cultural and Educational Centre – a non-profit organization that works to preserve Ukrainian heritage in Winnipeg. 

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Maybe you have a beverage that is popular in your area

Sometimes it’s not a food item, but a unique beverage that defines your destination. Beverage passes are popular too, and it’s pretty common to find great beer and wine passes. Seattle may be well-known for coffee already, so they went a different route. While we’ve seen very successful coffee passes across the country, Explore Seattle Southside decided to create a pass that shows their destination overexceeds with another really fun beverage, too. The Bubble Tea Trail takes thirsty travelers to 24 stops throughout Seattle’s Southside, and they can earn points as they check in at each location. They’ve created a really cute logo that aligns with the Bubble Tea Trail, and have that on branded t-shirts and cups that they use as prizes. 

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Use existing architecture to help tell your destination’s story 

One of North Alabama’s passes is used as a way to showcase some of the region’s most historic and spectacular architecture. They created the North Alabama Hallelujah Trail as a way to have a curated experience that features more than 30 churches that are at least 100 years old. Some are elaborate with intriguing stained glass, while others are more simple, but this is used as a way for visitors to experience part of the area’s spiritual history. The descriptions within the pass tell the stories of each structure, and point out fun facts along the way. You’ll even get to visit the church where Helen Keller was baptized. The churches are spread throughout 16 counties, and gives visitors a reason to dig deeper into this region of the state. 

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Consider creating a pass for your furry visitors 

While some destinations may be building a pass around an animal theme, some are building passes for animals. Knoxville, Tennessee takes pride in being a dog-friendly destination and they’ve done a great job of curating information for pet parents at visitbarxville.com. Since they’ve had other successful passes designed for humans, they decided to create one for their four-legged, furry visitors, too. The Barxville Dog-Friendly Pass is a check-in challenge that showcases several great dog-friendly places around Knoxville, and includes an embedded video within the pass that is narrated by a dog named Hank.  The prize on this pass also includes goodies for your furry friend. When you earn enough points, you can pick up a handkerchief, tennis ball, and sticker from the Visit Knoxville Visitors Center. 

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Sometimes you just have to step outside to realize your destination’s unique feature is right there before you 

Visit Tucson has other passes, but their organization started seeing that astro tourism was getting quite a bit of coverage. Since this is a destination that offers dark skies and minimal light pollution, they saw an opportunity to create an Astro Trail as a curated list of interesting places for stargazers. Although many departments within the organization are using the pass, the pass was originally built from a PR standpoint. Cindy Aguilar is the Vice President of Communications at Visit Tucson and shared in Bandwango’s Unique Pass Ideas Webinar,  “We’ve seen a tremendous amount of earned media coverage.” She said within the first six weeks of the pass being live, many of the top travel publications had mentioned it – including National Geographic and AFAR. 

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Are you ready to showcase that unique thing that makes your destination special? Reach out to our team to schedule a demo and start building your one-of-a-kind experience that visitors will love. 

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