Wrangell Cooperative Association has created a new position for tourism development, hiring Rachel Moreno for the job.
The move is one intended to better coordinate the
Tribe’s participation in the visitor industry, a growing segment of the economy regionally despite declines in other sectors. According to state labor statistics, tourism accounted for nine percent of all employment earnings in Southeast for 2015. The sector made up about 17 percent of all jobs, and is currently the fastest-growing. About 500 average annual jobs were added last year, and a total of 1,500 have been added since 2010.
Starting with a general
call to artists at the WCA Cultural Center next week, Moreno has a busy schedule ahead of her.
“I’ll oversee the dance show at Chief Shakes House,” she explained, “and get the gift shop at the Cultural Center operating, work with artists to keep consignment art coming into that gift shop, work with the cruise lines and their representatives to book groups of visitors into the dance shows, and just supervise the tourism staff.”
Moreno has been a board vice president and regional representative for the American Indian Alaska Native Tourism Association. She has worked five seasons as a tour operator for Sitka Tribal Tours, was on the Sitka Tribal Council for eight years, and has served on the SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium board for four years in all. She has also worked in a number of capacities as an art retailer, business owner and shop manager, and is the cultural activities coordinator for Mt. Edgecumbe High School.
Returning to Wrangell, Moreno has family ties to the island, and her great-grandparents Chester and Annie Worthington lived here. “This is part of my dream to help the Wrangell Tribe. I have very fond memories of being a little girl here, and those memories involve Shakes Island,” she recounted. “I’m starting to come back to what I remember Wrangell to be. I love Wrangell.”
She explained the community has a number of promising opportunities in the tourism sector.
“Wrangell has a different kind of cruise ship population than Sitka,” for one. “I think it’s a huge benefit. The smaller ships typically have passengers who, yes they pay more money for those cruises, but they get experiences that are not run of the mill, typical, kind of commercial. With Wrangell you get Wrangell.”
This opens up possibilities for different, more authentic experiences. Extended stay
visitors and small group
travelers in particular increasingly seek out more meaningful trips.
“The visitor can have any number of cuisines on their ship, but it’s not the same. They want to know what we eat, how we eat it, how we cook it, how we caught it,” she said. “It’s changing. They don’t just want a coffee cup and t-shirt to say ‘oh yeah, I’ve been there, done that.’ They want to go home with someone’s name, where they met them, what they were able to learn from them, and what they can share about the culture.”
What Moreno would like to organize is an experience that provides some of that, something that people can take at least half a day or more to partake in. This can include workshops such as drum or
paddle making, which present opportunities for sharing Tlingit and Haida culture as well as instruction in the art itself. Besides more than simply economic benefits, she explained a more robust tourism sector benefits the Tribe in other, more enduring ways.
“Visitors always ask me ‘what is your tribe doing to revitalize your culture and language?’ Believe it or not, it’s through tourism. When we can take school children, bring them to dance practice, they learn the songs, they learn the dances, and they learn to make regalia – that’s a big part of our identity and culture. And that gets perpetuated through tourism.”
The call to artists will be from 6 to 8 p.m. on May 25. Light refreshments will be served, and Moreno explained the session will be “to talk about marketing, production of goods, how to price their products, and the importance of keeping a steady supply coming to the gift shop.”
Tribal tourism is not a new concept in itself, but it can be new to individual communities. Retailing and the demands of maintaining a business can also be challenging for artists.
“A lot of times they don’t have anywhere to display their work,” she said. “They’ll make it, but marketing it themselves and displaying it is hard to do, especially in a small town.”
When the carving facility was first built in 2014, a gift shop showcasing local Native artworks was to be opened at its front end. The storefront has remained dormant in the years since, but Moreno intends to have it ready for business for the coming tour season.
“I hope to have the gift shop open in a month and stocked with locally made artwork. We’re going to have to also sell hoodies and coffee cups and highly consumable items just to keep cash flowing. But I have faith that we’ll be able to draw in a lot of local artists who want to commit to the gift shop, and have their work displayed,” she said.
Additionally, Moreno wants to improve visitors’ experience navigating town. She would like to improve signage for starters, and already has an artist working on some new wooden signage.
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