Something you should go. Something you should know is brought to you by Genesis gooldira dot com. That's also something you should know. You can put your retirement plan. I'm the gold standard. Learn more and get a free gold and silver guide at Genesis Goold. I r A dot com. Excited to have a guest in the studio. We have Casey and she's the executive director of Southeast South Dakota. And you've got a really fun project you guys are
working on. First of all, thanks for joining me to talk about this.
Yeah, absolutely, thanks for having me so are. The project we're working on is something that has kind of been percolating in my head for quite a few years. I came across this little have I brought show and tell with me.
But nice, we'll hold it up to the mike.
Yeah. I found uh this little pocket guide up in Fargo when I was in one of my previous roles with Visit Yankton, and I thought, gosh, this is just such a cool little little, you know, guide to help people experience all of the great places to eat in Fargo.
And so we took over the association Southeastuth Dkota Tourism in July of twenty two, so it's been almost three years, actually a little over three years, and so we're gonna jump in and see what we can do with this, but really try to shine a spotlight on all the fantastic places to dine in our regent.
That's awesome. And I was telling you, I scroll through Facebook and I'm like, oh, there she is again. Oh oh,
there she's again. So your video has been showing up in my algorithm a lot, and it's probably because I've even commented on Facebook before about how sad I am that I'll see a restaurant open and then I never want to be the first guy there because I'm like, well, I want them to kind of get a chance to do their thing, you know, and then they'll be in business for a while, and then they'll go out of business before I ever even had the chance to go there.
And I'm like, man, I feel horrible that I didn't go there. And we're on this little treadmill of like the same maybe ten places that we go all the time. It's either this one or that one. We drive by a dozen other places to go to the places that we're used to and we're comfortable with, and I wish that there was something out there that kind of drew people in. So we I seriously like ten ago we
were going to do something like this. So when I saw it, I'm like, I got to have you come in and talk about this because you not only did you save me the effort of doing it myself. My wife would have been furiated. It should have been very frustrated and mad at me if I would have said, Hey, I have one more thing we're gonna do. So I love what you guys are doing. Thanks. And now the
book is not ready yet, it's in the process. But the reason I wanted you to come in early is if there is a person listening that's going I would like to be featured in that. Yeah, you know, if you know of think right now your favorite place, because we probably all have like a favorite little tucked away place that if more people knew about this place, it would be good. Those people should reach out and talk to the folks that are putting this guide together. How do they get a hold of you.
Yeah, So we have a website Southeasouth Dakota dot com. We're located down in Yankton, so you could give us a ring down there. It's six oh five six six five two four three five, and we would gladly love to work with you. So the thing with this guide is that so we're we're a regional tourism office, So we're very much like a Chamber of Commerce, except we so are membership organization, but we focus primarily on tourism
and driving visitation to our part of the state. So any partner that is a member with us is going to be listed in this new publication for free. So not only will you be listed in this publication, but you will get a lot of other perks along with that. So we're just all about bringing people to Southeast South Dakota and trying to get them to explore everything that we have.
And how far does southeast South Dakota reach to the north and to the west, Because I understand south and east, but that's probably to the border. But how far west do you go and how far north do you go?
Yep, So we have fourteen counties. We run from Mitchell, we do bump up into Lake and Minor County, but then over to Sioux Falls and then down to the river. So the other thing that I always like to mention is that you know, when visitors go to a destination,
they don't care about borders. And we do have the ability to partner with folks just across the state lines too, So if there's anyone in Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska that has a restaurant that they want to you know, shine a spotlight on, we would gladly work with them as well.
I love that. That's really neat. And again, when when do we think the book itself will be ready? Will it be similar to the one you brought in here?
Yeah, so it's going to be the same size, about four x seven type size that.
Would fit in your purse or fit in your pocket or in your glove compartment.
Yeah, yeah, yes, So it should be ready in January along with our other peak season publications. So we do our own regional travel guide that we take around and we'll take all of these publications around with us to all the travel shows that we go to, and then we distribute them through the welcome centers and all of that. But then we also partner with the other three regions and travel South Dakota on the state Vacation guide as well.
I love that. Yeah, And again, tourism is a big deal. There's a lot of people. You know, I meet people all the time from other places. I'm one of the guys it talks to strangers.
I know.
Mom told me not to, but that's what I do for like a living.
That's a great South Dakota. It's an endearing quality. We're just so friendly and that's great.
I'll be filling up with gas and I'll see a license plate. I'm like, oh, Massachusetts. I'm like, say you from Massachusetts on your and oh it's a rental car. I rented it in Missouri. Whatever. So there's a lot of those where I guess wrong because the license plate is not always right. But in visiting with people to find out what brought you to this area, and there's so many people that are looking at moving here, which
is cool. I love that. But a lot of people just wanted to visit, like I've never been to South Dakota. I want to come check it out.
Yeah, we are very We are very fortunate to have the tremendous staff at Travel South Dakota. We really do have one of the best tourism departments in the entire country. And so if there are tourism businesses that want to learn more about you know, what travel South Dakota does and the four regions do. A great opportunity to do that is to attend the Tourism Conference. It's out and here in January, so not the best, you know, if you're looking for vacation, it's not really that, but really
it is. It's truly one of the top five tourism conferences in the entire country, and it's it's fantastic way to get plugged in.
I love that. If you've got a restaurant or a place that belongs in this guide, reach out and talk to the folks at Southeast South Dakota against Southeast South Dakota dot com as the website.
Thank you for stopping it absolutely, thanks for having me.
And I'm going to throw a link on our Facebook page as well to make it easy to find Facebook dot com. Slash Sunny Radio at Facebook dot com Slash sou Falls News. Something you Should Know. Something you Should Know is brought to you by Genesisgoldira dot com. Put your retirement plan on the gold Standard. Get a free Gold and Silver Guide now at genesisgoldra dot com.