Six Delaware towns have signed on to a collaborative tourism effort with various communities on Maryland’s Eastern Shore.
“Eat, Drink, Buy Art on Delmarva” is a regional campaign to promote downtown arts and culture districts. The initiative has launched a website, mobile app and a Facebook page to lists artists, art venues, restaurants and events in each area participating.
The joint tourism program includes downtown areas that have completed work to become designated Main Street communities or arts and entertainment districts in their respective states.
Lee Nelson, Executive Director of Downtown Milford says the partnership makes good business sense.
“The idea behind this was to be able to harness all of our individual marketing efforts into one greater vision and we felt we could get more bang for our buck by having all of us put our funds together and promote the whole region rather than promoting each of our individual activities,” he says.
“One of the common characteristics is we are all small towns and so if we can all work together and appeal to the larger markets like Washington D.C, Baltimore and Philadelphia, that is advantageous to everybody.”
Each downtown organization is responsible for maintaining its own segment of the website and keeping event listings current.
Nelson adds the partnership also allows communities to cross promote, and tourists to develop itineraries.
Milford’s page boasts its seven working artists’ studios and numerous art galleries.
The other Delaware towns participating in the tourism campaign are Dover, Middletown, Rehoboth Beach, Milton and Newark.
Visitors can view information on each community at eatdrinkbuyart.com