The Anson County Board of Commissioners unanimously approved a new brand proposed by the county tourism board during its Feb. 2 meeting.

Jeff Boothby, chairman of the Anson County Tourism Development Authority, and Buzz Bizzell of Bizzell Design made the proposal.

The new brand incorporates rustic elements, such as wood inspired by peach crates, with images promoting agri-tourism and outdoor recreational opportunities within the county. One sample billboard replaced the county’s traditional welcome signs and featured a kayaker, with text advertising Pee Dee Wildlife Refuge. Others promoted the idea of taking a road trip on U.S. 74 to Anson County.

“Now, once you have this in place, the visitor who drives through Anson County has a great idea of what’s here,” Bizzell said. “It’s a long stretch if you’ve ever driven from one Anson County gateway to the other. It’s a long stretch, probably one of the longest county roads, continuous lines, that there is North Carolina, so that gives us a huge opportunity to say a lot about Anson County to a lot of visitors.”

Boothby acknowledged that Anson is a county people pass through on their way to the beach, not a tourist destination. He hopes to see that change.

“Initially, we just want people to stop and spend a little bit of money passing through,” Boothby said. “But as they come and see what’s going on, the idea is to get them to come just to Anson County, or, if they are going to the beach, plan to take some time to go for a walk at the Pee Dee Wildlife Refuge or stop at the park in Peachland to walk their dog when they’re coming from Gastonia to the beach, stop in Wadesboro at the farmers market, walk uptown and get a bite to eat at one of the restaurants. There’s one now, hopefully there will be more in the near future, so that we can just start to get that general trend in our traffic of knowing that Anson County is a good stopping place to spend some money and is becoming a good final destination for a trip.”

The new brand was formulated by Bizzell and county stakeholders through workshops using exercises such as imagining how Anson County should be promoted in a mock issue of Our State Magazine.

Bizzell also showed commissioners designs of wayfinding signs for the county, uniquely designed sign posts directing visitors to parking opportunities and areas of interest. He also told the commissioners of the need to create events to attract guests to, and showed images of a possible welcome center that could be placed just outside the downtown area of Wadesboro.

The town of Wadesboro gave the TDA its blessing on Feb. 1 to move forward with the brand. Bizzell and tourism board representatives plan to speak with other town boards to get municipal approval of the brand and generate interest in the project.

Neither the town nor the county pledged any financial contributions when they approved the brand. The tourism board paid for the first phase of the project, which included coming up with the brand and sign designs. The next phase is designing the signs, but Bizzell said most of that is already completed except for talking with the North Carolina Department of Transportation for approval.

The third phase is branding the town’s events to generate interest. The success of both the second and third phases hinged on the approval of the county brand.

Commissioner Jim Sims said he is supportive of the project.

“We’ve wasted money on a lot less important things in this county and a lot less productive and to move as far,” Sims said.

He made the motion to approve the branding portion of the project, since it was already paid by the tourism board and for the county, it “wouldn’t cost a cent.”

Bizzell said most counties and towns he works with spread the project out over two years to divide the financial burden into multiple fiscal years.

Boothby said that dividing the project over two or three years will be fine, and that the project will ideally be finished around the time that the upcoming Agri-Civic Center is completed in order to provide signs and marketing at the same time that the planned building may bring in more guests.

Reach reporter Imari Scarbrough at 704-994-5471 and follow her on Twitter @ImariScarbrough.

By Imari Scarbrough

iscarbrough@civitasmedia.com