Event

Kingston: Total Solar Eclipse


Winner
Submitted ByTourism Kingston

Objectives

On April 8, 2024, Kingston experienced a total solar eclipse – a rare phenomenon that hadn’t occurred in the area for over 700 years. This opportunity was leveraged to generate shoulder-season tourism.

  • Create a week-long “eclipse festival”
  • Attract visitors before and after the eclipse
    • 40,000 visitors
    • 75% hotel occupancy rate
  • Generate economic impact

In May 2023, Tourism Kingston created a working group of local attractions, parks, historic sites, Queen’s University, and the City of Kingston.

Events programmed include Fort Henry National Historic Site; a Lake Ontario cruise; Art After Dark in Downtown Kingston; Kingston Pen Tours opened early for the season; and Tourism Kingston presented a 360-degree film dome. Restaurants offered celestial-inspired menus.

We established a unique look and feel for the campaign that was applied to advertising, pageantry, social media, and merchandise. A graphics toolkit was shared with partners.

An advertising campaign, including a dedicated webpage, was launched and an earned media strategy pitched the eclipse in Kingston for coverage starting in fall 2023.

We worked with a videographer to capture the eclipse. We licensed “Closer to the Sky” by Kingston band The Glorious Sons, and only hours after the eclipse, a video was released.

Effectiveness

In total, 45 experiences were presented April 3–8. Ten eclipse-viewing locations dispersed traffic across the city. Each location had Eclipse Ambassadors who received training from astronomers. Select sites also had live music, food trucks, and other programming.

Tourism Kingston sponsored free transit, encouraging visitors to leave their cars behind. We worked closely with the City of Kingston to support their emergency planning to ensure a safe event.

The total solar eclipse brought 74,428 visitors to Kingston, creating $25.8 M in economic impact.

45.8% of visitors stayed overnight. Hotel occupancy averaged 77.7%, reaching 84% on the weekend (20% above seasonal average).

Campaign results: 20 M ad impressions; 258 K ad clicks; 556 stories & 470 M earned media impressions; 203 K web sessions; 261 K video impressions in 24 hours.

Challenges & changes

The eclipse would take place over a few hours. The challenge was to motivate overnight and multi-day visits around this limited-time event. Presenting a range of events and marketing it as a festival were key to dispersing visitor arrivals and extending stays.

We faced evolving emergency management plans from the city. Strong communication and partnership were critical.

Target audience

 We targeted couples and families within nearby markets: Ottawa and Toronto, both would not experience the total eclipse. These are two of Kingston’s primary markets allowing us to build on existing awareness.

The campaign was executed in phases, taking advantage of long lead time to capture potential visitors before other destinations.

Sustainability

  • Sponsored free transit (electric vehicles).
  • Multiple viewing locations across the city dispersed crowds.
  • Eclipse glasses were collected at viewing locations and the Visitor Information Centre, then donated to Astronomers Without Borders.
  • Utilities Kingston water buggy diverted 2,800 plastic bottles and provided clean drinking water at primary viewing location.
  • instead of going to landfill, pole pennants were re-laminated and reused.
Sponsors