Visit McMinnville outlines leaner budget, new website and PR push in annual presentation

Dan Gibson, chief executive officer of Visit McMinnville, told the McMinnville City Council on May 27 that the destination marketing organization (DMO) paid off about $200,000 in debt since he took the job and is proposing a fiscally conservative plan for the coming year that emphasizes marketing, public relations and building reserves.

Gibson said Visit McMinnville’s final actual budget for fiscal 2023–24 was about $1,297,000 and that the organization is aligning its 2025–26 plan to that realized revenue figure rather than a larger proposed figure from the prior year. "Currently none" is Gibson’s answer when asked whether Visit McMinnville carries debt now; he said a line of credit and roughly $200,000 of debt existing when he began were paid off, and the organization aims to increase reserves from about $140,000 toward $200,000.

The nut of the plan is to shift dollars from payroll into marketing and PR while maintaining staffing levels sufficient to carry out the work. Gibson said projected payroll at the previous staffing level would have been about 43% of the budget (roughly $559,000) and that projected payroll for 2025–26 is about $448,000. "We need these businesses to be open as much as possible," Gibson said, describing the goal of stabilizing year-round lodging and hospitality employment rather than relying on seasonal swings.

Gibson outlined line items and goals: about $200,000 for marketing, roughly $140,000 for public relations; a proposed website rebuild budget he identified as $35,000; social-media and Google ad line items (Gibson referenced $35,000 for social and $25,000 for Google); contingency funds of $50,000; and a print/collateral allocation (Gibson said roughly $75,000 of a $340,000 print/collateral total) to produce a McMinnville-focused visitor guide and other materials used in partnership with local media. He also identified a target of launching a new website by October 2025.

Gibson said Visit McMinnville wants clearer, reportable performance metrics for campaigns and to measure the economic impact of its work, noting that the organization has not yet calculated a reliable advertising-to-economic-impact ratio. He described recent public-relations results: since February, the PR contractor and the DMO generated about $6.2 million in media value and set a target of $10 million in earned-media value.

On programming, Gibson said Visit McMinnville will continue destination-development work—supporting outdoor amenities, event sponsorships, group sales and partnerships to bring second days or satellite events to existing festivals. He cited an ongoing conversation with the owners of the Mac Theatre and plans to work with regional partners such as Travel Oregon and the Willamette Valley Visitors Association for opportunistic campaigns.

Councilors asked about financial controls, local partnerships and lodging trends. Gibson said April occupancy had outperformed statewide trends—his data, he said, showed McMinnville 24% over year-ago occupancy for April and 15% higher hotel revenue year over year for that month. He discussed two upcoming lodging projects: a Marriott-branded property at Evergreen (groundbreaking scheduled January 2026, by his account) and a smaller Paquette project in permitting for about 24 rooms in the Alpine District.

Gibson also listed measurable goals should the budget be approved, including launching the new website by October 2025, increasing social media engagement by 35%, and increasing December revenue per available room (RevPAR) by 5%.

Council comments were supportive and included follow-ups about partnerships with Linfield University, event strategies and creative promotions (councilors and staff joked about McMinnville-branded air fresheners and potential scents). Gibson said Visit McMinnville will continue coordinating with the Chamber of Commerce, the MDA and local businesses and that the organization is looking for ways to track the return on its marketing investments more precisely.

The presentation did not include a formal council action on the budget; Gibson said that "if there's significant change to the amount of the budget, we come back to the council to discuss what we would do with that."