GILROY
– The Gilroy Economic Development Corporation has earned a top
honor from the state’s top membership organization for economic
development professionals.
GILROY – The Gilroy Economic Development Corporation has earned a top honor from the state’s top membership organization for economic development professionals.
The California Association for Local Economic Development, or CALED, awarded the GEDC a grand prize for the city’s promotional efforts last month in its 2002 Award of Excellence competition.
“We’re very familiar with the economic development efforts of Gilroy and are often touting and using Gilroy as a good example of a community that’s committed itself to economic development,” said Wayne Schell, CALED president and CEO. “We were very pleased to be able to support them with this award.”
The award honors achievements in the field of economic development. It specifically targets a recently launched GEDC marketing campaign that’s meant to remarket and reposition the city to attract high-tech sector businesses.
Launched in late 2001, the campaign’s theme reportedly emerged from a quote by Mayor Tom Springer and presents Gilroy as “Silicon Valley’s newest high-tech industrial growth center.” It includes branding and market positioning, target marketing, advertising, post cards, profiles of recently relocated companies and a glossy brochure and map funded by a grant from Calpine Corp.
“The challenge of the campaign was to create new thinking that there is more to Gilroy than garlic,” said Bill Lindsteadt, GEDC executive director. “We created a campaign featuring high-tech images and testimonials from local CEOs citing Gilroy’s cost-saving factors and employee-retention benefits.”
Officials said it helped bring Entegris, a Fortune 500 company that provides cleaning and handling products and services for sensitive computer components, to open a facility on Rossi Lane last year.
Lindsteadt, EDC President and Gilroy Realtor Susan Jacobsen and Strategy One CEO Jennifer Faughn accepted the honor, awarded at a conference last month in Monterey. Strategy One is a strategic planning and marketing firm that helped create the campaign.
Lindsteadt said credit for the award is also shared by the city’s overall economic vitality partnership, which includes the city of Gilroy, Gilroy Chamber of Commerce, Visitors Bureau and realtors and developers.
Jacobsen said Lindsteadt’s arrival has made a big difference.
“Bill is doing an excellent job,” she said. “It takes somebody to be instrumental, to not take no for an answer and trudge ahead for the businessperson.”
