Changing the Narrative: Peter Gamez on Leadership, Storytelling, and Oakland's Soul

What does it take to transform perceptions, inspire a community, and lead a destination through change?

In this episode of Business Class, Learn Tourism's Stephen Ekstrom sits down with Peter Gamez, President & CEO of Visit Oakland, to explore the power of positive storytelling, servant leadership, and collaboration in destination marketing.

Growing up in San Francisco as the son of Cuban immigrants, Peter developed a deep appreciation for education, community, and cultural identity. After spending more than two decades helping build Kimpton Hotels into one of the most influential boutique hospitality brands in the world, he made the leap into destination leadership.

Peter shares how Oakland's people inspire his work, why tourism professionals need a seat at the economic development table, and how changing a destination's narrative can create lasting impact. Along the way, he reflects on lessons learned from hospitality pioneers, the importance of mentorship, and why curiosity remains one of the most valuable leadership traits.

Whether you're a destination leader, hospitality professional, or simply passionate about creating stronger communities, this conversation offers practical insights and inspiration for leading with purpose.

In this episode:

•  Why collaboration beats competition in tourism 
•  How positive storytelling can transform perceptions 
•  The leadership lessons Peter learned from hospitality visionaries 
•  Tourism's role as an economic development strategy 
•  The future of AI in destination marketing 
•  What makes Oakland one of America's most soulful destinations

Business Class is brought to you by Learn Tourism, the nonprofit academy - harnessing the power of science, business psychology and adult education to advance the tourism industry and build sustainable economies. Learn how to engage your community, win over stakeholders and get more visitors at learntourism.org. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Good afternoon. How are you? Doing good. How are you doing today? I am absolutely living the dream. I love the glasses. I am a huge fan of funky frames, and I have a lot of them.

SPEAKER_01 0:13

All right. You should probably do what I do. I have readers in every room of my house.

SPEAKER_00 0:18

Oh, yeah. So I don't have a house. I don't have an apartment. Uh-huh. I travel full time. This is my bus. So I actually travel in my bus. You're nomadic. I read a little bit about that. I am in Billings, Montana. Oh, all right. It's a part of the country that I hadn't spent much time in. Um we work with a few destinations around the state, so it's an excuse to go and visit. Um, and it's connect the dots on my way to Portland for DI.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

Yeah. Montana's on my bucket list. Started off with Bozeman. I've always wanted to check out because Kimton did a hotel there that had a theater attached to it or next door. So I'm always fascinated by that. And then the one and only opened in Montana as well, right? The one and only resort. It did, I believe. When did that open? So that's a new brand that's opened recently, that's located in another part of Montana. Yeah. And that's a state that is on my bucket list.

SPEAKER_00 1:23

I want to go check it out. It's it's beautiful. I mean, it's it's really pretty. I drove through Bozeman on the way here. We spent the weekend in this small town called Virginia City, which has you know some of the ghost town type buildings, but then in between the the old storefront and the old shop, you can walk into like a museum. There's yeah, an ice cream parlor or a restaurant, or you have been on my radar for a very long time. Oh, good.

SPEAKER_01 1:48

That's a good thing, hopefully.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

It is a very good thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:52

I am Peter Gambes. I am the president and CEO of Visit Oakland. Well, my background for 26 years was on the hospitality hotel boutique lifestyle side. That's been proven to be very helpful in my role here.

SPEAKER_00 2:09

When you were growing up, did you ever see yourself working for a destination organizational?

SPEAKER_01 2:15

Growing up, definitely, I think in tourism or the media world. I am a very lucky guy that got to be born and raised in San Francisco, which is a tourism mecca to begin with. And I also culturally, my background is my mother and father met in San Francisco. They're Cuban. My mother was an educator. So I've always had uh education and travel in mind, and they were adventurous. We didn't wind up in Florida, we wound up in San Francisco, and I think that that mindset stuck with me. So either, yeah, definitely a new tourism or for sure something in the uh media world.

SPEAKER_00 2:55

What do you love most about what you're doing now in Oakland?

SPEAKER_01 2:59

I love what I do most about in Oakland is I think many destination professionals would share with me with their destination or its people. I I tease people and say, hey, I'm a native San Franciscan. My heart was left in San Francisco, but my soul is in Oakland. Oakland is a very soulful destination, which is just a 13-minute ferry ride from San Francisco. Just having that contrast of Oakland makes it so special and makes it fun for me. How did you end up working in hospitality? Wound up in hospitality because, as I said earlier, I saw myself in media and I was that bad for TV that I said, well, I better. But all kidding aside, I did want to do broadcasting, but it would take me away from San Francisco. You in that world back then, when I was in college, you would have to go to a smaller market. So started in hospitality by being fortunate and meeting Bill Kimpton and starting in the Kimton Hotel Group. But really, my move of working with Chip Connolly for 26 years. And Chip was a visionary in San Francisco that wanted to grow a company, which at that time was very a rebel within our own world. And it was a company that was surrounded by big brands, yet we were outperforming the others purely by how we became such a fixture in the neighborhoods and really a fixture in the cities and highlighting what made them so special and grew be able to grow that company to four brands and 160 hotels later was an amazing part of my career that I cherish every day.

SPEAKER_00 4:42

What did it take you to switch from hotels to destinations?

SPEAKER_01 4:46

Really, what took me to switch from hotels to destinations is when our hotel group was purchased by Hyatt. That's when Hyatt was growing their independent boutique lifestyle brands. And I'm a Hyatt fan, and I believe that their distribution system is what was needed for some of these smaller boutique companies, but I really did not want to continue on the hotels. I thought that that was an opportunity for me to switch it up. So I was inspired. I led as a board chairman at San Francisco Travel. I was their board chair during some difficult times as well. And when I saw the opportunity open up in Oakland, a CEO role, I wanted to bring that knowledge, my love for the Bay Area, that operational knowledge that I received as a board chair and put it into practice in Oakland. And that's what made me do the switch.

SPEAKER_00 5:39

So you're constantly posting on social media the things that you're doing and you're out and about in the community. What do you do in your downtime? Do you have any?

SPEAKER_01 5:48

Oh, I definitely have a downtime. I think that I wouldn't be in my role or happy in my role if I did not have a downtime. I think that to be healthy, I think you need to occupy your downtown sometimes with things that aren't tourism related for me, but tourism related in the sense I'm a big foodie. I even travel for culinary. And luckily, I'm in a culinary capital myself here in Oakland. So in my downtime, I do being a big fan of that of culinary and culinary tours, I do that. I also love history and a sense of place. I think that that has always been my case. I think it's coming from parents that immigrated from somewhere else and being fascinated by that, and then living somewhere that's so history-rich, like San Francisco and the Bay Area. So I, on my downtime, you'll find me either looking up something that's historical or participating in some sort of event that that involves that.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

I was sitting at Thanksgiving dinner a couple of years ago, and my one uncle, who's a school administrator, turned to the other uncle and said, How are your classes going this semester?

SPEAKER_01 7:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:01

Because that uncle was a professor. And then I looked around the table. My sister was an instructional designer.

SPEAKER_01 7:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:08

My other sister was working in an elementary school. And here I am in the adult learning space. Yeah. There's something really special about you know having that educator background from your parents. How do you think you're most like each of your parents?

SPEAKER_01 7:22

Well, I'm definitely, I think that being an educator is also servant leadership. I talk a lot about servant leadership in my role here. That curiosity also that educators provide that, but also servant leadership of a duty of making yourself a better person, either through education or helping others. And, you know, if I was to look around my Thanksgiving table, I would look at my brother who was in law enforcement and chief of police here in the Bay Area. And, you know, some of my friends say, wow, you guys have taken two separate paths, right? One gamma is hospitality, the other one is chief of police, law enforcement. But that common thread is that we're serving our community and it's a sense of responsibility that we're supposed to do good by our community and help those people be better by highlighting it, either making it safer, as my brother would say, or by me highlighting it as well and making it more of an economic engine for some of these cities and for tourism to be viewed that way as well. How will you know if you're successful in your job? I think that one way is constant feedback from your team is required. You only know your success by either those that you're leading, but also you'll see it by having clear and measurable goals. I think the clear and measurable goals is the boring part that we could talk about. I think if you're a CEO in any business or in any role, you should have clear and measurable goals. But how are you impacting those people in your community? How are you impacting your team? I take a lot of pride that when I see some of my own team members be a vice president in an organization or grow and be a CEO or an entrepreneur doing their own things. I think that bringing out the best of a team member and see how they've grown their career is really the my most rewarding moment. I have an employee that now is turned basically into my family that I've been working with now for close to 20 years, and to see his career and the luxury market set and how he's grown just brings a smile to me all the time.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

It's funny you say that I have a member of my team now who's worked with me three times previously, and back in the 1990s. So that's great. Some people stick with you.

SPEAKER_01 9:43

They do, they do. So it's a I always tell people that it's a family that sticks with you, but also they keep you honest and they also remind you in your best moments and worst moments of how you make them feel, right? And how far you've come. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:00

What advice would you have to give your younger self?

SPEAKER_01 10:04

To give my younger self is probably patience, which I've grown as I've matured. But looking back at my younger self, realizing this is I've been lucky enough to work through different levels of technology that right now, even something that I did this morning or a half hour before I met with you, I kind of giggled, going, wow, this would have taken me a half a day before until I now have this technology. But uh patience, I think that's one of the things I would uh teach my younger self.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

And what do you look for when you're sourcing out new people for your team?

SPEAKER_01 10:43

I sometimes I definitely look for someone that is open to constantly evolving themselves. I really feel that I am not fully evolved and everyone on our team isn't. So someone that's open to evolving is a must for me. I also look for people that are competitive, but in a way that keeps us top in our game, meaning competitive and wants to be the best in class, but at the same time isn't mowing over people that get there. So you can still be competitive and be probably one of the most collaborative people you could ever meet. Sometimes you don't understand that in the level of maturity that you're at with your career, but I do look for that competitive quality.

SPEAKER_00 11:29

I think in the destination space, that's one of the uniquenesses in that you may be competing with other destinations for a piece of business, but at the end of the day, that business rotates and moves around. So you get to collaborate and learn from each other.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

Yeah, collaborating, learn from each other. And listen, I have the city of San Francisco connected to me via a bridge, a ferry, and a subway. And if I was to not wish for this success, it would be very foolish on my part. And I remember my first day on the job here as Visit Oakland CEO. My first phone call was to the city of San Francisco's tourism office to tell them I'm here and what are the bridges we can build to just make us stronger? A busy convention calendar in San Francisco impacts Oakland, if we like it or not. We can still keep our own distinct personalities and we can be our own self and who we are as a destination. But we know that when they succeed, we succeed as well here in the Bay Area.

SPEAKER_00 12:31

What are one or two of the greatest initiatives that you hope to put in place under your leadership?

SPEAKER_01 12:40

I think that there's been some highlight moments in the last four, four and a half years. Definitely starting with positive storytelling for Oakland. Oakland is one of those cities that I always ask people, when was the last time you're here? Or is it something that you've heard through the media of maybe what your perception is of Oakland? And with my media background, I made that my priority in day one to change that, to make it more of a positive storytelling and not necessarily leaning on the headlines that you see. We're talking about being measurable and strategic. We definitely look at it. I've partnered with an amazing director of communication and public relations that we share our same mission of increasing visitation to Oakland and sharing our story with our people and our locals to change sometimes a negative perception that you might have of a city. And we've been able to see that positive storytelling triple in the last four years and the impact that that has. We're going heavy on the speed of that. We're not slowing down on that in any way. Also, capturing moments that are positive, such as Alyssa Liu, when she won the gold medal. We put together in less than 15 days a rally that got thousands of people to come in downtown Oakland and celebrate not only her gold medal, but her grit and her tenacity is what Oakland is known for. And being able to get national and international coverage as a destination and uplifting that to a positive storytelling was a highlight in my last couple of years. And then there's the things that we should be doing, right? Like having an amazing website and definitely focusing and leaning on our meetings and events world, but adding an Oakland touch to it that so many great co-workers of mine throughout the country do with their destinations. I think at times with Oakland, you just need to try a little bit harder, purely because of preconceived notions of folks. And we're changing that notion each and every day. I can see it, and I've seen the progression in the last four years.

SPEAKER_00 14:47

What three words would best describe you?

SPEAKER_01 14:52

Three words driven, co cooperative for sure, collaborative is another one. I think my collaboration with the community and our mayors and our leadership is necessary. Driven is because I'm competitive and I like to see us win and be recognized. And the third trait that I would have is to be extremely humble. And what I mean by that is I can't do all of this on my own. If I don't have an effective team and being humble when we win, and being humble when we recognize, I think people see that authenticity. I think it's important to uh carry that as a leader. What's something you're looking to learn this year? I'm gonna join the masses of AI. I think that if there is not one morning I wake up that there's an article about AI, I think that that's gonna be constant. It's hey, listen, it's technology that's here, that's being used already. Again, I'm fortunate that we are in the San Francisco Bay Area, which you know, you can just swing a cat. There's an AI consultant here for me. I mean, it's we're living it. And I think that rather than fighting it, I encourage my team on how are you utilizing these tools on a day-to-day basis to just make us more effective? But we're talking about AI and marketing right now, and how are we even positioning ourselves as a destination? I think it's smart that we continue on learning that this year. Another thing that I'm gonna be focused on learning is what is the economics of a destination management company? I mean, how can we continue with our funding? Is it only going to be through a D-bid process? What are other economic ways to make us stronger for the future as a DMO? And that's why I really strongly believe that we need to be hand in hand with any economic development department of a city or state or region that you represent. If tourism isn't looked at as an economic engine, then we are doing a disservice to the organizations that we're leading.

SPEAKER_00 17:06

If you have to throw elbows to get yourself at the table.

SPEAKER_01 17:09

Oh, absolutely, throw elbows, but also I think that I was talking about being humble and modest at times with our wins. This is not the time to use that trade when we are showing that we are increasing jobs, that we are providing for people that live in these communities, that we are contributing to the taxes of the city and making it a better city for them to live in. We need to be shouting that from the top of the mountaintops. That's what we need to brag about, or that's what we need to definitely constantly be amplifying. And I see it here in Oakland. When you align yourself with your community, with the mayor's vision and getting their backing, we go hand in hand. It's not just attracting a convention, but it's showing what a convention does to the coffee shop across the street from the center and how that employs three people full-time, because someone's going to go grab there and get a croissant and a coffee or highlight a bakery because what makes them so special. So, yeah, going hand in hand and elbowing our way in with economic development. Although for pure transparency in Oakland, they've been great partners and really sharing in our vision. Uh what's the most challenging part of your job? I think the most challenging part of my job is changing a negative narrative of sometimes of destination, a negative narrative that might have been created now for decades, or it might have been an incident that happened two or three years ago. But that's our job is marketing and positive storytelling. So it's challenging, but it's not impossible. But sometimes it could go, okay, this is being mentioned again. For example, it's a city that doesn't have sports teams. Rather than focusing that we lost three sports teams, we're not talking about which we are highlighting as a visitation or a DMO, is we have an incredible soccer team that's rooted here in Oakland. We have a championship Pioneer League baseball team. We're bringing cricket to the Coliseum, which is one of the fastest international growing sports, and we're bringing domestic here in Oakland. That's the storylines that we need to be focusing on. Stop talking about the three teams that we lost. Why aren't we talking about the economic engine that tourism is bringing through concerts, special events, hand these local teams that we have now? And how are we making a difference there?

SPEAKER_00 19:42

It's amazing the economic impact that a concert can have. Or a sporting event. I saw something, there was an article just today. A sporting event brought in 21 million in economic impact in one evening.

SPEAKER_01 19:54

Absolutely. And we have we're lucky, Ariana Grande is doing our kickoff world tour is in Oakland. There was an article in our local San Francisco Chronicle SF Gate, their digital platform, on how concerts at the Oakland arena are now the hottest thing. And the Warriors aren't playing there because it, which is some people say, oh wow, that's bad. I'm a big Golden State Warrior basketball fan. I'm glad they're playing at Chase because it opened up our arena for more concerts. So now that's a we're being able to have concerts midweek, weekends, hot weekends that were sometimes taken by a basketball game. Although I love that aspect of it, but the concerts and special events are critical, and it is economic engines for cities.

SPEAKER_00 20:43

I'm gonna send you my dates when I'm gonna be in town. One of those concerts lines up, you know, coincidentally, I might be available.

SPEAKER_01 20:50

That sounds good. You're always welcome. What's something I didn't ask the you wish I did? I think we've spoken about collaboration with other destinations. I think that's always important for me. Uh, rather than getting another destination as an enemy, it's aligning yourself with those destinations around you is going to get stronger. So I'm glad you did that. I think that we do hear about an international travel decline in our country. I mean, it's no surprise, right? We just came out of IPW and U.S. Travel shares amazing reports. From all that noise, I do want to recognize that there are some countries that though are increasing travel. Listen, Mexico is showing an increase in travel. And I'm in a city that has direct flights, one of the most in Northern California. I think that we need to keep focusing strong on those markets that are performing. I recognize that globally we also need to make an impact and bring back international travel overall to the United States. But let's also focus on those markets and how are we taking care of them now? The ones that are performing is going to be critical, I believe, in the next 24 months.

SPEAKER_00 22:07

What's something you'd like to ask me?

SPEAKER_01 22:09

I want to ask you is what motivated you to start your this business sector? I love that you're nomadic and you go, but what was the one turning point for you to start what you're doing today?

SPEAKER_00 22:23

There were three things that happened. Number one, my sister, who's an instructional designer, organizational psychologist by trade, with her master's in technology and engineering, asked to come with me to a tourism trade show. The first workshop we attended, we walked out of him and she looked at me and said, Are they all this bad? And I said, Oh no, they get much worse. So that was an aha moment. You know, something's broken. Yeah. If that's the case, something's broken and there's got to be a fix.

SPEAKER_01 22:53

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 22:54

Around the same time, I was traveling up to 130 nights a year, working with destinations, identify product and bring product to market. As much as work travel can be daunting, I found that I loved trying new foods and meeting new people and seeing new things and new experiences and new places. And what I put together around that same time was that it was the fact that I got to learn about each and every one of those things. So now I have this love for learning and a problem to solve with how we're teaching people in the tourism space. Yeah. So in the background of my destination consulting work, we started trying everything technologies, methodologies, theory, psychology, web analytics, data about how people learn. And then COVID struck the item.

SPEAKER_01 23:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:49

I had the option of either restarting a consulting firm from scratch, or if I'm gonna start something from scratch, let's focus on education. Yeah. And you know, that education, it meant that I would be able to learn more. And one of my favorite quotes is Robert Heinlein, who says, When one teaches, two learn.

SPEAKER_01 24:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:10

Yeah, absolutely. And we have developed a culture of learning within the organization. There's never been a no when somebody says they want to do some professional development. There's never been a no. Yeah, there's never been a no when somebody says they want to try a new skill or they want to take on a new task. Read a book recently that said choose worthy rivals. And my biggest rival is the person I was yesterday. You know, I want to be better today than I was yesterday. And I think that's something that everybody in my team shares.

SPEAKER_01 24:44

And there's some days that you don't feel that way, and some days you do, right? How do you check yourself on that?

SPEAKER_00 24:50

I think that one of the things that one of my team members said yesterday was that we did an emotional intelligence training yesterday. So Sheena came in and she did this training for everybody in the team. And one of the questions was how do you deal with a challenging situation with a difficult customer or a mistake? And one of my team members pointed out I asked the client or the partner or the vendor, whoever it is, how can I learn from this situation? What can I learn from this? Teach me. You don't have to be defensive.

SPEAKER_01 25:34

No. Yourself to do, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:36

Yeah, you don't have to be putting your head in the sand or digging your heels. Yeah. If you are genuinely open to learning from every situation, good, bad, or indifferent, you know, you're a better person for it.

SPEAKER_01 25:49

That should check and balance in a way, too.

SPEAKER_00 25:52

Yeah, absolutely. I've said repeatedly with my team the biggest mistake you can make is the one you don't learn from.

SPEAKER_01 25:58

Are you headed to Portland? You're you're off to Portland, and that's in we're gonna be there in July, right?

SPEAKER_00 26:05

We'll be there in July. I'll be in the Portland area a little bit before that.

SPEAKER_01 26:09

Okay. That's there, she's been pretty cool. When I have my conferences, I always try to connect with her, and there's a lot of similarities that Portland and Oakland have as well when it comes to the food scene. And I'm looking forward to seeing her success because I know she's only done that now. I think it's her second year on the job or third year as well.

SPEAKER_00 26:32

Second getting into the third, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:34

So it was cool.

SPEAKER_00 26:35

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. So when we get there, coffee's on me.

SPEAKER_01 26:39

Absolutely. Double cappuccino. Folks want to plan a trip to Oakland. How would they go about doing so? You could start off with our office, and we can design what kind of trip itinerary you want. I think that's the easiest way. We kind of break it up into verticals that you would be familiar with: sports and outdoors, arts and culture, attractions, or culinary are kind of our buckets that we play with, but they interchange with each other, really depending on what you are looking for, what do you want to learn from this trip or experience you're looking for? Yeah, fun. So design that.

SPEAKER_00 27:16

Thank you, sir, for sharing your time with me. I really appreciate it. And I'm glad we're finally connected.

SPEAKER_01 27:21

Absolutely. And please keep in touch, and I'll see you in Portland.

SPEAKER_00 27:25

Enjoy your day.