How New York City Tourism + Conventions Sells The Iconic And The Unexpected

New York City is one of the most famous “brands” on earth, yet selling a trip to NYC still comes down to the same hard question every marketer faces: how do you keep something iconic feeling personal, current, and worth the effort? We sit down with Nancy Mammana, Chief Marketing Officer at New York City Tourism + Conventions, to get inside the strategy behind promoting a city that never stops changing, and to understand what “authentic” really means when millions of visitors arrive with completely different tastes, budgets, and comfort levels.

We talk about NYC’s resilience, and why the city doesn’t have an awareness problem, it has a discovery problem. Nancy breaks down how her team tells a fuller story than the headline attractions, using local opinions and neighborhood voices to guide people toward the unexpected across all five boroughs. We also dig into value-driven tentpoles like Restaurant Week, Broadway Week, and the broader Winter Outing push, including how these programs support local businesses during key periods of need and help visitors plan a weekend that actually feels doable.

Then we go deep on AI trip planning and what it’s changing right now. Nancy shares what they're learning from AI-powered tools on their site, how traveler queries are becoming more nuanced, and why keeping information accurate and up to date matters more than ever as people plan through ChatGPT-style experiences. We also look ahead to the FIFA World Cup and how fan zones and citywide activations can turn tournament energy into exploration, community, and real economic impact beyond the stadium.

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Recorded Thursday, April 9th, 2026
Hosts: Damian Bazadona, CEO & Founder, Situation & Maureen Andersen, President & CEO, INTIX
Guest: Nancy Mammana, Chief Marketing Officer, New York City Tourism + Conventions
Producer: Peter Yagecic, Founder, A Mind at Work Consulting

https://situationinteractive.com
https://intix.org
https://amindatworkconsulting.com

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introduction

Peter Yagecic 0:04

You're listening to Fandom Unpacked from Situation and INTIX, the series where we unpack modern fandom with some of the brightest minds in sports and entertainment. I'm producer Peter Yagecic, and our hosts for today's QA are Situation CEO and founder Damian Bazadona and President and CEO of INTIX Maureen Andersen. Our guest today is Nancy Mammana, Chief Marketing Officer for New York City Tourism + Conventions. They are the official destination marketing organization for NYC, whose mission is to drive travel, tourism, and economic impact, promoting the city as a premier destination for both leisure and business visitors. That's quite a mandate. And since we have so much to unpack, Damian, why don't you get us started?

Damian Bazadona 0:44

Thank you, Peter. And thank you, Nancy, for joining us. I know there's a lot happening in New York City right now, so I know things are very busy. So thanks for joining us.

Why New York Stays Resilient

Nancy Mammana 0:53

Oh, my pleasure. Thank you for having me.

Damian Bazadona 0:55

All right. So what makes New York City so damn resilient? And I asked that because I feel like the the the number of you I you see the headlines, micro and macro headwinds over the years. New York City is kind of the center of everything. And what how do you chalk it up? Like what would you say is what makes it so resilient?

Nancy Mammana 1:12

I mean, that's the question for the ages, I think. Um we've always been resilient. I think we were founded on resilience. And I think it's just in our DNA, and we've proven it over and over again. And certainly the pandemic uh we took quite a blow with that. I mean, we all did uh around the world, but I think uh that was even testament to how resilient we are because we're we're we're surely back. But yeah, I I think that's just who we are. It's our DNA.

Keeping An Iconic City Relevant

Damian Bazadona 1:40

You're from New York originally, correct? I am. I was born in the Bronx. I love it. How do you so how do you think about so obviously New York is one of the most iconic brands in the world, but it's also one of the most competitive tourist markets. There's a lot of places people can go. Uh and you know, obviously your mandate obviously is getting as many people as possible here to New York City. And how do you, I'm just curious how you think about, you know, keeping this the city feeling both globally famous and and and and both personally relevant, both to locals and tourists. It's a different thing. And I know in some of our pre-call you said something which I just absolutely loved. It was something to the spirit of we try not to do anything a New Yorker would be embarrassed of, which I think is awesome. So tell me more, please.

Nancy Mammana 2:23

Well, I think we're very lucky as an organization to have this. We, you know, this is a product like any other product you'd be marketing, uh, that is in fact New York City and does have an experience to offer everyone. Um, so it's really just our job to make sure that we're telling the right story of New York and educating people who may not be as familiar with all that we have to offer because you may only know us from the iconic destinations, which we want you to visit. We want you to go to the Empire State Building and to the Times Square and to Broadway. Uh that is that is top of our list. But if you've done that multiple times and you might want to explore something more unexpected, there's there's plenty for us to talk about. So uh and we don't have an awareness problem. I don't know that you find anyone on the planet who's never heard of New York City. Um I I haven't I haven't met them yet. But um I think so that's not our issue. It's just more about nudging people toward what they may not know about it. And there's something new happening every day. There's new businesses opening every day. So we just want to are we focus on really lifting up what makes us unique about uh about the experience of coming here and how diverse and welcoming we are, and then nudging people toward the things that they may find more unexpected.

World Cup As Citywide Platform

Damian Bazadona 3:36

I find just obviously the World Cup coming, it's it's just like it's putting another level, obviously, on top of everything. How do you how do you think about you kind of mentioned this before, but think of like an e you know the ecosystem of experiences? Yeah. And there's no other city on the planet. Um, yes, I'm biased. I'm I'm a Queens boy. Um everything from, you know, but Broadway, sports, restaurants, museums, all these different components. How do you guys think about kind of A, I guess kind of connecting those different touch points and just the side of the city? I think people know Manhattan, but like obviously Staten Island, the Bronx, Brooklyn. And, you know, I know a big thing that over the years, restaurant week, Broadway week, a lot of weeks I don't even know, like Hotels Week. Can you talk a little bit about how you think about how you're sort of, I don't know, introducing people to the full palette of options? It's just a lot.

Nancy Mammana 4:22

Well, we consider the World Cup to be tremendous opportunity. Uh, we were selected as a host city and in particular to host the finals. We think because there is uh no other uh fandom like there is here across our all of our communities, uh the fan base is here, we're the center for media, we really are uh one of the top sports towns in the country, but certainly the fans are here from every uh every region around the world that is participating in the World Cup. So we're not here to sell tickets to the World Cup. We want to invite the folks that are coming in, whether you're coming in from New Jersey or Connecticut or you're coming in from a farther afield market to find your community and to nudge people again toward exploration, anchoring uh through the fan zones and the official events that are happening. But around those, when you go to Queens for the fan fest, here's what's around that area and here's where you should explore and enticing people with what is great about all of the boroughs because we know there will be people out and exploring. There will be people here that don't have tickets, that just want to join in the festivities. So there's there's a lot to work with. Again, we're lucky. So we're we're using it as a platform to take advantage of this influx of visitation and celebration to get people out and about exploring. So uh again, we're not, we're not, we don't need to sell tickets to the games, but we do think there's an opportunity to showcase the fan, the cultural communities and the food and the culture and art that is here that will be relevant to those fans. Um, so so that's what we're focused on.

Damian Bazadona 5:57

How do you center but on the programs like Restaurant Week and Broadway Week? How in your mind, how are they mostly centered? Are they centered around as a vehicle to remind New Yorkers why they love New York? Or do you think of them more as a little bit more holistically for tourists? Just curious uh in terms of how you leverage those programs.

Nancy Mammana 6:15

Yeah, I mean, with we we created the original Restaurant Week. We are the OG of Restaurant Weeks in 1992, and it was designed during the Democratic National Convention to give folks that were coming in uh an affordable way to sample local restaurants. So meal deals for $19.92. That's how it was created. It was fairly small, but it was a curated list of restaurants to get all the delegates coming in out for some some reason to come out and explore. The program has evolved quite a bit. We have over 600 restaurants in that program, and we do it twice a year. Um, it's incredible. And we do it during key need periods. So when the restaurants need particular help, you can call it a shoulder season. But January, February, and July, August. And you know, particularly in January, when we've got a lot of visitation here for the holidays, we don't need to do very much there. But certainly in January, when the tree comes down, it gets a lot quieter here, but there's still it's a great value. So we center a lot of the programming at that time of year. So, for example, January, February, we do what we call winter outing, which is a collection of those programs that all happen at the same time. So we have Broadway Week, restaurant week, Musty Week, and we've developed Hotel Week, New York City Hotel Week over the last four years, just to give an added incentive. Because when you add all of those things up, now you have an overnight visitation driver. It's great value. We call winter outing because we want people to get out and explore the city, fewer lines, more value, all of that. During a time of year when our members and our businesses need a little bit more support. And then in the summertime, it's a mixed bag. July and August, I think things have changed a little bit after the pandemic with working from home and the way we look at summer and all that. But I think it's also a time where we need some more support. And then you have Broadway week in September, which is typically a slower time, as you well know. And then we go into off-Broadway week in October. So it they really are meant to just lift up and support our local businesses. We do get a lot of New Yorkers who participate in those programs. And then I would say the tri-state market, Northeast Regional Corridor, you might you may not fly here from Europe to go to restaurant week and experience that. But you might if you had all these other programs happening at the same time. And it's really just meant to sample. You might try a restaurant that you typically would not because it's a more affordable price point. And then after coming for restaurant week, maybe you're more inclined to go back. So we're we designed it for that. Um, it also is just a great, it's a great deal, it's great value. So we have three different price points. The restaurants can choose if it's a lunch or dinner offer based on their check average. We we want as many in the program as possible because we know it's a sales and traffic driver, and it just gives them a little amplification at a time where they might need it a little bit more.

Damian Bazadona 9:00

I feel like it eventises like it kind of as a local, it kind of advantizes your own backyard. Things we might take for granted. And every time it always reminds me, I'm like, oh, yeah, we should go do that. It's I I think I think I'm a big fan of those programs.

Nancy Mammana 9:10

Yes, thank you.

Damian Bazadona 9:11

Yeah. Uh Maureen.

Maureen Andersen 9:13

So it's it's great to see you today. Thank you so much. I'm fascinated by this topic because, you know, New York's iconic. But, you know, everybody has their own opinion about it too. And that's what's interesting, is that everybody brings something to the table. You know, and arguably you are marketing, you know, this the greatest entertainment and experience city really in the world. And you have not only the locals, but you've got the out-of-towners, the first-timers, the return people. And I'm curious, is that what is a from a fan point of view, what is a great night out look like or even a long weekend today? And are there certain ingredients and elements that make that experience feel seamless and exciting and worth repeating, which I'm sure you all talk about a lot?

Nancy Mammana 10:01

That that's that's pretty much all we talk about. I mean, honestly, we we have uh about a hundred New Yorkers that are very opinionated who work here. And they, if you know, if you have a passion for New York City, this is a this is in fact a great place to work because I I I happen to love the opinionated nature of New Yorkers. That is how we center our content. It's also helping us honestly future-proof a little bit against AI, because you cannot replicate uh personal opinion. And because that's who, again, who we are as a destination, we want to lift those opinions up because the truth of the matter is, it may sound trite, but there is literally something for everyone. So, what your long weekend looks like may be very different than what mine does. And there's something for you and for me. And if you ask three people, you know, what their favorite places are and where they like where the what's the best pizza, you're gonna get probably six different opinions. So we love that, and none of it's wrong. It's just that we have that much to choose from, and not a lot of cities can say that. So as a destination marketer, I'm very lucky because I I I like to showcase that as much as possible. There are other cities that have great food and they have great culture, but I don't know if the abundance is there as it is here. So I I want different opinions. I I love when people disagree. And when we go sort of man on the street on our social channels, um, I love that because you know it's not an argument, it's just, well, no, don't go here, go there. Well, don't go there, go there. You know, and that's great. And I and I love that, but that's gonna get you to a short list of places that you might want to check out because when you get enough people saying that the best pizza is here, now you may be onto something. So it's it's unique to us, I think. Uh, it makes it fun. And there are a lot of other voices besides ours that we like to bring into the conversation uh just to help folks, you know, experience it authentically because there's no wrong answer. It's just there's just a lot to choose from.

Maureen Andersen 11:59

And I presume that there's a lot with, you know, now of looking for that seamless kind of way of curating your own experience is AI must be playing into this for you.

Nancy Mammana 12:09

Yes, absolutely. We're we're seeing uh we have two different AI-powered bots on the site. One is for meeting planners. Uh, we call her Ellis, and then the other is for consumers, which is Libby. Um, I'll let you guess what that stands for. So it's really informed our content strategy because these live alongside our programs. And so we're seeing the way the way we used to have Restaurant Week on the site was very collection-based and filter-based. So I'm looking for Italian drop-down, midtown drop-down, much like you would find on some of the reservations apps. We now see this being very different. They're more planning conversations and they're they're akin to what you will find in an AI power tool. So I'm looking for a Thai restaurant next to X Museum here. I'm looking for a family-friendly restaurant uh that's near X uh observatory. You know, help me understand what's accessible. You know, there's a lot of those types of things that are not, it's not a straight-up filter approach. Um, and it's a lot more nuanced. That is the way the queries that you, you know, I'm sure you're seeing yourself in AI are materializing. So it's helping us reorganize our content and the way we are surfacing the content. It's informing uh what content we produce because we're seeing what's resonating. And so as we see, look, free and affordable, uh, one of the top queries that we've been getting for the last several months. So we've now lifted up all of that content. We already had it, but we're making it uh a little bit more uh clear and quicker to find because we know it's top of mind, makes sense, but we're seeing it. We had uh some interesting results with Broadway Week, where we had uh a significant amount over, I would say about 1,200 uh queries that went directly to ticketing partners between ChatGPT and our bot that we would not have gotten through regular search that are going directly to you know, leading to transactions, which is obviously what we want to see. But that was sort of unexpected. The tool's only been live since last June. So we're we're learning a lot. And that that's that's a real-time focus group and you know, looking at sentiment and what people are concerned about. And with World Cup, we we we launched it really to see as a proxy how this would help with World Cup. Now we can really see, well, is is is March the right time frame for planning? Are people still booking their trips in March? Or are we now are they looking to book or are they looking to plan? How is that now bearing out as we lead into June? We're watching that. Are we talking to people that have already booked and now we just try to direct them on where to go, or are they still looking at to hope the hotel pages and you know what's happening? Because it's a little bit of an unprecedented event for us, and we're we don't know. I don't think any destination knows how this will bear out. So we're watching it. Not only are we watching it for accuracy and making sure things aren't hallucinating and checking it, but also what are people asking about? Where where are their heads at so that we might reinform our media and what we're doing and the content, the way we're speaking to people? So, and it's translated into 68 languages, which our website is only five. And you know, that that's a humongous benefit given all the people that will be coming here. So, so yeah, it's been a great tool that we've been just trying to harness.

Maureen Andersen 15:25

Well, the World Cup is an exciting proposition because you know, there's a finite number of tickets and availability and getting access to them. So you're creating experiences that are like outside of a stadium, but still deeply involved in the actual tournaments themselves, watching the games and eating and being with family in a neighborhood, you know, with you know, like-minded and finding those elements, I would the the research after the fact will be really interesting to see how that kind of goes too. Agreed. Agreed.

Nancy Mammana 15:53

We're we're trying to make sure that as many businesses that can benefit from the influx of visitation do benefit. And that's going to be how we measure ourselves and how we measure, yeah, how these tools have been supporting that effort.

Damian Bazadona 16:09

Hey guys, Damian here. I just want to take a quick moment to say if you're enjoying this podcast right now, odds are you're in the business of selling live experiences. And if you don't know my team at the advertising agency Situation, you most definitely should. Aside from just being an awesome group of human beings, they're a global team of professionals covering a brand base in sports, arts, theater, culture, museums, or any live experience that requires people coming together. Big, small, all shapes and sizes of brands. You can hit them up at the information below in the show notes.

Reducing Planning Friction For Visitors

Maureen Andersen 16:50

You know, a lot of our audience is, you know, my constituents who are working in ticketing and live at events, and they're they are constantly looking for inspiration and ideas and maybe the secret sauce of what it looks like to create from inspiration search to booking to arrival. And what are opportunities that you see in the space today to reduce the friction of planning for a New York trip that makes it feel easier, more accessible, and more welcoming, especially if you're a newcomer, a first-timer to the city?

Nancy Mammana 17:28

Well, I think we're all, all of us in the destination landscape are leaning into AI because it has materially changed the way people are planning their trips. Uh, we see it happening, and so, and we're all looking to how we might evolve our own channels to not only compete with that, but work with it. So we just make sure that we are, yes, to remove friction and also to remain relevant, making sure that our content is continually refreshed so that we show up as an authoritative source. Even if they're not coming to our website, we want consumers to get our information. So it surfaces and Google AI and Claude, et cetera, or ChatGPT. Uh, because we want accuracy and we also want it to be current. We don't want things that are no longer happening or closed or what have you to be to be in that data that gets pulled. So we have human beings that are constantly updating it and making sure it's refreshed and accurate. Uh, we we think AI is the reason it's been so popular is because it is removing some friction. I can get most of what I'm looking for in one place, but we need to remain in the mix. So between what we're doing on the back end to uh lean into it on the coding side of things and on the front end in terms of what type of content we're making, featuring people and opinions and insights that are coming from real interviews and subjects. And then our social content is extremely valuable, making sure that we're telling people where they they could be going, but not only that, it's so what else can I do when I get there? What's a half day look like there? How do I get there? And just keeping it user-friendly because we don't want to take for granted that we're an easy place to navigate. And I'm not sure that that's true. So, especially if you're a first-time visitor. So we don't want to, it's overwhelming to begin with. So we're just trying to make it simple and turnkey and again make a day of it, make a half day of it. You're not gonna go perhaps all the way to a different borough if it's just one place to go, perhaps. You but you might if you go to a cultural and you go to lunch and you're doing something else, you know, that's now uh making it a lot more enticing. So again, we're just trying to surprise people and let them know based on their interest, you know, playing with some personalization between our channels, what they might be interested in, and nudge them toward something they perhaps didn't think about uh to help them along, but making the content they are looking for easy to find.

Maureen Andersen 19:52

Wonderful. Hey, uh Peter, I thought uh you sent a note we have a question for audience.

Refreshing A Legendary Brand

Peter Yagecic 19:57

Yeah, uh Nancy, I'd love to work in one of the listener questions we got over at fandomunpack.com uh before we started taping. And I love this one because unlike you and Damien, I I'm not originally from New York, I'm from Philadelphia. So just a little bit next door. But even as a kid growing up in the 80s, you know, New York has such a strong history of iconic branding. And even in Philadelphia, I knew what that brand was. So the question from our listener is how do you refresh an iconic brand that's been around for a long time for new generations without losing the magic that people maybe associated with it for years and years?

Nancy Mammana 20:36

Well, it's inter it's an interesting question because you know, we don't we rebranded ourselves as an organization three years ago, and we understand the depth of that type of undertaking, but we don't feel we brand New York City. Uh, we do spread the positive messaging around New York City, around the world through our global communications efforts so people understand what is really going on here and how welcoming and diverse we are. And we we want to make sure that what the character is of New York City is being properly amplified. And that's what we stand for. So that is that is an engine that runs at all times. Um, but we we just we consider our job to be lifting up the voices of New York City and what New York City is in its truest form through our content and communications, both paid and organic and earned, because there is so much to talk about here. And it's not, we we don't like to rely on the news cycle to tell our stories for us. We we want to tell that story on behalf of New Yorkers and all of us. Visitors also have their own opinions of what New York City means to them, whether you're someone who's lived here your whole life, someone who just moved here and consider it your adopted home, or someone who may have only visited once. There's a lot of uh personal attachment to what New York City means because I think there is something relevant for everyone. So it means something different to everyone. So we don't consider it to Be a brand that is, you know, static. We just want to make sure that what we really feel we represent is adequately uh promoted and shared around the world, if that makes sense.

Why Experiences Still Matter Most

Damian Bazadona 22:13

Hey guys, Damian here. If you're listening to this podcast, I'm gonna bet that you're probably thinking about how your team works and adapts right now in this new technology landscape. That's why the one person I always point people to is my co-host, right here, Peter Yagecic, and his company, A Mind at Work Consulting. They run smart, tech-infused workshops that help teams build new skills and actually put ideas into action. Peter is way too humble to brag, but I have no problems bragging for him. So if you're serious about what's next, talk to a Mind at Work Consulting. More in the show notes below. And I I I asked that because I've seen a lot of, I know a lot of your content. You guys go deep with trying to show sort of the different layers of the flavor of the city, not even at the superficial level. And like I feel like a lot of the AI systems are semi-superficial. Here's an agenda of stuff to go do, but doesn't really tell you necessarily the why or the depth or just the color in between. Yeah, I'd love to. How are you thinking? I'm just curious, what do you think the future holds in terms of how people choose value value where they go next?

Nancy Mammana 23:36

You know, I've been in marketing a long time. Uh, we touched upon this, I think, on the pre-call. I I I think we've always discussed as an industry how people value experiences. Um, I don't think that ever goes out of style. And I don't think it ever will go out of style. People are looking for connection in whatever way they find it. And New York City is a busy place. It's big, there's a lot here, it could be overwhelming. But if you if you take a little bit of time to walk the city and meet people and discover things that are a little bit more unexpected, you're gonna find that connection in whatever way you probably want to find it. Whether you are looking to go deep in culinary and meet a mom and pop who own a restaurant in Queens that have been there for 30 years and how and why they make their food a certain way. Or if you want to find, you know, an artistic community or your musical community or theatrical community, there, there, if you go, if you take the time to talk to people here, you're gonna find that and then some. I think that's what people look for now. I think that's what they'll always look for. They're looking, look, there's certainly gonna be a time, and I find myself at times wanting to sit on a beach and do nothing and not talk to anyone, and that's fine too. But for the most part, I think you want to find something that reflects who you are and what your interests are and seeing yourself in a destination and connecting with other people and experiences. I I just don't think that's a trend. I think that's just what people crave. Maybe, you know, I'm old-fashioned, but I I just think that we offer that in space, and that's part of the reason why people come keep coming back here.

Damian Bazadona 25:08

Yeah. Maureen, back to you.

Maureen Andersen 25:11

So you're New York is a huge convention and tourism city, and you have a lot of conferences coming in and out. And I'm I'm honored to have brought my particular association to your beautiful and wonderful city three times. So I I know that it drives attendance and it is often a gateway for many, many people who, when they feel comfortable coming with their own kind of tribe or group of people, is coming with a convention gives them that kind of first business, you know, moment, but then they decide I want to come back because they feel more comfortable. And how do you think that turning that in attendee who comes in for work into someone who leaves feeling like a fan and that they want to come back and that they are embracing the passion of the city?

Nancy Mammana 26:02

Well, we look at a meeting delegate as a traveler. I mean, you're certainly, if you choose to stay on or come early, well, you know, the the term of the year, leisure. Um, I think there's no real difference in how we would speak to you. Certainly, the hook may be the meeting or convention you're attending, but we also think the minute that's over, you're, you're, you're a leisure traveler, perhaps. And we don't want you to be treated in any other way. Uh, we re-architected our website to make sure that our we used to have a separate meeting planner site and consumer-facing site. Though the back end of those sites has now been merged so that if you're if you're coming to the site from a meeting, you could very easily get to the content uh that is more public-facing for leisure travelers. So we we have certain services. We have obviously a very robust convention sales team uh that works to bring in and support those events that come in. It is a big business driver for an economic impact driver for the city. We also have a destination services team that when a meeting is booked, they can help support with things for delegates. So we have a delegate pass that offers discounts if we need room blocks, whatever the case may be. So we help support that experience. But uh we we hope that you're experiencing our channels like any other traveler once once that meeting is booked, then you know you're coming. So we we just try to make it easy to do so.

What Marketers Miss About Travelers

Peter Yagecic 27:22

I'd love to sneak in one more uh listener question before we wrap up. Uh, we have a lot of marketers who listen to the show across all kinds of live entertainment verticals. And and this one stood out to me. It what's one misconception marketers often have about what today's travelers want out of a destination? Is there something that you've seen that you think, oh, that really missed the mark?

Nancy Mammana 27:45

I think for us, obviously we're particularly in tune with doing this. We do this every day, but when we see others doing it uh in the travel space, if for us, it's primarily wanting to see more well-rounded content that also involves the boroughs and small businesses that really could complement the more iconic attractions. But I think because we're here, clearly we're the most informed on the product offering here. So, and not not everyone is. You may not become, you maybe you haven't come to New York in the last year and you might not be as aware as we are. So we just want to make sure that the experiences that are marketed are robust and well-rounded. Because that doesn't always happen just because, again, the the entity who's doing so either may not think people are interested for whatever reason, uh, you might not be able to entice someone going to a small business, but we we disagree. And it's just about mixing that in with the more iconic. So there's an unexpected against something more known. And we have seen that that is very powerful when we market New York City. And so we always encourage that when we we don't always see it.

Peter Yagecic 28:52

Great.

The Surprise Of Fearless Visitors

Damian Bazadona 28:52

Damien, do you want to wrap us up? Yeah, sure. And uh, Nancy, thank you for taking the time. Um, I'll just say I know this is probably one of the busiest years in what we would say, a New York City tourism travel uh history, dare I say. There's a lot going on. And I think the work that you and the team do, I think is just remarkable on behalf of the city. Uh it's and from my understanding, woefully underfunded compared to other cities that spend a lot more. And the impact that you and the team do is just super significant and uh incredible. So as a as New Yorker, thank you. Um and so I just want to end on you know, from the Bronx. You're like a New Yorker, and here you are in this job selling New York now. And like, what has surprised you most about visitor behavior in New York? It could be global trends, it could be individual trends. Like, is there anything that surprises you in your role as you sort of just watch tourism in New York?

Nancy Mammana 29:53

Well, it's interesting. Now that I've gone, I've worked in New York my whole life, and this is definitely a full circle moment for me being here. Um, and getting a little bit closer to tourism here, I am I am actually very impressed with how intrepid visitors are. When you get an international visitor who doesn't necessarily speak the language, that does not mean that they will not get on the subway, get on a ferry, and really explore. Um I I find that remarkable and very impressive because you know, you think about yourself. If you go somewhere across on the other side of the world, it could be intimidating to do that. And we we do find that international visitors are very intrepid and very adventurous. And I love that. And we want to encourage, we can do try to encourage more of that. So, and sometimes even more than locals, which is great. I mean, you know, we all know people that if they won't go below 14th Street if they live uptown. So when you see this, it's great, it's fantastic. So we lean into that. But I I was really surprised to see that when I my first, I would say, year really watching the patterns of of travel from country to country. And it's hold firm. I've been here eight years and and still intact, no matter what happens to our total levels of visitation, which are also intact, thank goodness. But uh yeah, they they will go. And they if you entice them, uh they're not afraid to explore. So I love that.

Closing And Listener Call To Action

Peter Yagecic 31:10

Oh, I love that answer. Uh Peter, you want to take us out? Absolutely. Uh, that is gonna do it for this episode of Fandom Unpacked. Thank you, Nancy, Maureen, and Damian. If you liked what you heard today, please check out all the great QA interviews we've done over at fandomunpack.com, or by searching Fandom Unpacked and following the series in your podcast player of choice. We'd also love for you to rate and review the show while you're at it. That really helps us find new fans. We'll be back in your feed in a couple of weeks. I'm Peter Yigisick. We'll see you next time.