To improve its ability to serve the tourist industry in Mackinaw City, the Mackinaw Area Visitors Bureau is adding at least four new members to its board of directors. The Bureau wants to increase communication with other organizations, such as the Village Council, and is redesigning its official slogan and logo to make the area more marketable.

“More people at the table means more wisdom,” said Executive Director Marilyn McFarland of the board expansion.

The board will link itself to the Village Council by adding Steve Schnell, zoning administrator for Mackinaw City. He will be joined by Greg Hokans, director of development and marketing at Mackinac State Historic Parks, and Dean Steiner, service manager for the Mackinac Bridge Authority.

The Bureau also will add a member from one of the Mackinac Island ferry lines, Ms. McFarland said.

“We sent out letters to each boat line asking them to nominate a representative,” Ms. McFarland said. “We will decide which member that will be in December.” she added.

According to Ms. McFarland, these efforts will help bring together various organizations within Mackinaw City, factions which have not always communicated well in the past.

To do so, the bylaws of the Visitors Bureau had to be changed. Under the old rules, the board was limited to seven hotel owners, one restaurant owner, and one gift shop owner, but Ms. McFarland said that this did not adequately reflect the tourism industry in Mackinaw City as a whole.

Ms. McFarland hopes the new village, bridge, state park, and boat line representatives will add insight to ongoing Bureau projects and help generate new ideas.

One of the most important Bureau initiatives, she said, is working on a new “brand” for Mackinaw City, a project Bureau members have been developing since last May. The image of Mackinaw City, promoted in the visitors guide and on the Mackinaw City Web site, is a series of three tiles representing the Mackinac Bridge, the Old Mackinac Point Lighthouse, and Fort Michilimackinac . The Village Council and the Mackinaw City Chamber of Commerce have similar images and these organizations also are involved in revamping of Mackinaw City’s image.

The Chesapeake Group, Inc. of Baltimore, Maryland has been hired to work on the new marketing concept with Mackinaw City and has spent the past summer and fall processing surveys and holding discussion groups with business owners and residents.

When the analysis and new images are finished, Ms. McFarland said, a task force formed by members of the Chamber of Commerce, the Village Council, and the Visitors Bureau will decide whether to implement the plan.

“This should happen by the end of the year,” she added, “and the new marketing strategies will be phased in slowly over the next two years.”