As Reading Pride celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, city groups continue taking steps to welcome the LGBT community to Berks County. Reading participated for the first time in the Human Rights Campaign Municipal Equality Index, the year after a tourism summit highlighted LGBT visitors as an untapped market.
“I think it’s smart,” said Jeff Guaracino, who helped develop Philadelphia’s award-winning tourism campaign: “Get your history straight and your nightlife gay.”
“You’re showing people your community is worth discovering. Reading sits between large population centers with thriving gay communities,” he said, noting Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and New York City.
In December, HRC released its fourth-annual Municipal Equality Index, which rates a community’s policies regarding LGBT residents. Reading earned points for the 2009 amendment to its nondiscrimination policies that added protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
“The City of Reading is right now the only municipality in the area that has protections for the LGBT community,” said Ben Renkus with Reading Pride, the city’s LGBT organization.
Overall, the city reached only 58 points out of 100, but that’s on par with the first-time scores of other Pennsylvania municipalities like Allentown, Erie and New Hope, the latter of which is considered a top gay destination.
Rainbows for Reading
Crystal Seitz, president of the Greater Reading Convention and Visitors Bureau, called Go Greater Reading, said her organization decided to get involved with marketing to the LGBT community after a 2014 tourism summit with Berks organizations.
“Our research has shown that lesbian women with children are more interested in spending their money in family-friendly destinations with educational attractions,” Seitz said. “Berks is a great family destination.
“I’d love to encourage more LGBT visitors,” she added. “When they see the beauty of the area and what we have to offer, they may want to come back and live here or open a business here.”
Seitz highlighted Centre Park with its historic mansions as an emerging destination. Reading Pride hosts its annual LGBT festival in the park, and the Inn at Centre Park is one of the top places to stay for people traveling from out of town for the summertime event.
“Any effort we make toward becoming more inclusive is a positive,” Seitz said.
She said Eron Lloyd was the city official who pushed for Reading to participate in the MEI. Before Lloyd pleaded guilty in November to federal charges in a pay-to-play investigation of City Hall, he had a penchant for thinking getting Reading ranked could be good for business. Lloyd also secured national ratings for the city for sustainability practices and bicycle friendliness.
Go Greater Reading partnered with Reading Pride after the summit to compile a list of LGBT-friendly businesses in Berks. More than 150 entities, from hotels and restaurants to museums and attractions, have received rainbow stickers that say “Greater Reading” to hang on their front doors, Renkus said. He said they signed pledges that say they’re willing to serve LGBT customers, and if they have LGBT employees, they’ll be treated equally. The LGBT-friendly businesses are listed under the resources tab at www.readingpridecelebration.org.
“Reading has a lot of things I think would interest the people of our community,” Renkus said. “Reading is very well known for promoting the arts. There’s a lot of antiquing in the area. We have a lot of outdoor activities.”
Pride in sports
There’s also been a recent push to get more LGBT visitors into the city’s sporting venues.
The Reading Royals hockey team started a Reading Pride Night last year as a fundraiser for the LGBT organization. This year’s event takes place Feb. 19 and tickets cost $15.
A busload of people from Philadelphia has made the trip to Reading every summer for the last three years to visit FirstEnergy Stadium for LGBT Night with the Reading Fightin Phils. Last year, 900 LGBT Night ticket holders joined other baseball fans in the 9,000-seat stadium.
“We consider ourselves a mini chamber of commerce,” said Anthony Pignetti, director of business development with the Fightin Phils. “Everyone can mix and mingle. Others can hear the Reading Pride message.”
This year’s LGBT Night will take place Aug. 1. Rainbow flags festoon the plaza outside the stadium and Reading Pride has a table at the entrance to tell people about the LGBT community in the Reading area.
“The idea is to get more people into Reading,” Pignetti said. “We want to work with everyone.”
Pignetti said LGBT visitors had been “an untapped market in this area,” and noted, “In general, the group spends a little more.”
Small cities, big reach
FirstEnergy Stadium is one of the few Minor League Baseball venues to receive a TAG-approved designation. Community Marketing Inc., an LGBT market-research firm based in San Francisco, maintains the national list of TAG-approved hotels and attractions that welcome the LGBT community.
The Fightin’s stadium is the only attraction in Reading to earn TAG approval. The hotels that received the designation include the Best Western in Cumru Township, the Courtyard by Marriott in Wyomissing and the Inn at Reading in Wyomissing.
“Twenty years ago, just a couple of organizations were reaching out to the LGBT community,” said Dave Paisley, senior research director with Community Marketing Inc. “Really Philadelphia broke through what I’m going to call the ‘non-gay Mecca’ destinations, so that’s anything outside of San Francisco, New York City and Amsterdam.”
Paisley, a Reading High School graduate, said LGBT tourism campaigns spread three years ago to medium-sized cities like Louisville, Ky.; Richmond, Va.; and Rochester, N.Y. The trend now is to see smaller cities like Reading marketing themselves to the LGBT community.
“There’s not really great data on the success of the smaller cities yet,” Paisley said. “But it’s something we’re seeing more and more.”
Visit Philadelphia has some numbers that Reading might consider. In 2003, the city’s tourism board spent $900,000 to launch what was to be a three-year campaign with the tagline “Get your history straight and your nightlife gay,” said Arturo Varela, media relations manager. The campaign included print ads and a television commercial.
A 2005 study, conducted by Community Marketing Inc., found a campaign impact of $153 in visitor spending for every $1 spent by Visit Philadelphia. The tourism board developed a custom survey that found gay and lesbian hotel visitors in 2010 spent more and stayed longer in Philadelphia than they did in 2005; spending increased 21 percent to an average of $878 from $726 per trip, and length of stay increased to 3.1 nights from 2.5.
Lesbian and gay visitors also spent at least 50 percent more than the average tourist at hotels, restaurants and stores in Philadelphia.
Paisley said smaller cities may have faced backlash for trying to attract LGBT visitors even 10 years ago, but it’s not seen as “unsafe” anymore.
“Marriage equality really opened the doors for a lot of places to market to the LGBT community,” he said.
Paisley said there are also tangential benefits to smaller cities having an LGBT-affirming reputation.
“People will think it’s a much more progressive and interesting place,” he said. “It really impresses millennials. Outreach to the LGBT community is something millennials like, gay or straight.”