Kristen Reynolds became CEO of Choose Chicago, the city's tourism marketing organization, six weeks before the city hosted U.S. Travel's annual IPW conference in June. Formerly CEO of Discover Long Island, Reynolds also worked with the Arizona Office of Tourism and Starwood Hotels & Resorts. News editor Johanna Jainchill spoke with Reynolds at IPW about the Route 66 centennial, the Canada market and being nimble.
Kristen Reynolds
Q: What's something that's stuck out for you since you took over at Choose Chicago?
A: A lot of people say, "How do you represent a city that you are not from or you don't know," and it was the same thing when I went to New York from Arizona. But I see it from a visitor's perspective, and sometimes it's the best way to kind of pull out all the wonderful things that a city has to offer and that locals might sometimes take for granted or not realize is really special because you see it every day. So moving to Chicago, being a visitor in my own city, is so incredible. I get to see it every day and am just awe-inspired by the beauty, the experiences and most of all, the friendliness.
Q: How will Chicago celebrate Route 66's 100th anniversary in 2026?
A: We are the beginning of Route 66, and the team has already spent the last year preparing for that, putting mile markers in specific locations, making sure that people understand the exact spot where Route 66 starts -- which is essentially the Art Institute [of Chicago]. The Art Institute has a whole Route 66 tour you can do. We want to work together with the other Route 66 destinations; it's not about each individual place. We've got things cooking for all the destinations, where visitors can come and get one seamless experience.
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Q: You started this job at a time when inbound travel numbers were down. What are you seeing now?
A: Last year, we reached a record-breaking 2 million international visitors. We want to grow that, but that's 2 million out of 55 million visitors. We rely more heavily on domestic visitors. What we're seeing is flat to slightly up from a lot of inbound markets, particularly Latin America, with a dip, certainly, from Canada. To mitigate that, we've got some fun promotions we're talking about. Hosting IPW really helps to expose Chicago. It's a great opportunity for us to remind people about things like Route 66 and that the Obama Center opens next year (the Center includes a museum and presidential library). We're doing our best to stay in the marketplace and continue to welcome those visitors, but we're also looking at people domestically who aren't traveling as much internationally as they have in the past and trying to capture that market, as well.
Q: I've been hearing that from other destinations: They're shifting marketing from Canada.
A: I've been in this industry for 27 years now. I've been through 9/11, I've been through recessions. And of course, the pandemic. This is not the first time our industry has gone through challenges. Being nimble and being able to change your strategy and look at emerging markets and make sure you're seizing every opportunity is how destinations stay successful.
Q: What's behind your new campaign, "Never Done. Never Outdone"?
A: We asked community members,'What do you think of this city? What represents you?' The message that came out is, "We're never done. We're always changing and evolving, and we can say we're the best." So we're going back out into those communities and saying, "What are you the best at? How can we promote you?" And that really helps, because visitors want a campaign and a destination that is authentic and really represents the local community. It's important for us to make sure we're representing every aspect of our city.