You might see new or more advertisements for Forest Park in the coming months.
The Forest Park Chamber of Commerce and Development supports the village’s business community and markets the village so business owners, residents and visitors want to spend time in town.
During a presentation at the Sept. 22 village council meeting, the Chamber’s executive director Laurie Kokenes laid out how she’s been using funding to market Forest Park, and how she plans to use money in the future.
ARPA funding for the Chamber
After the Village of Forest Park received $1.86 million of funding from the American Rescue Plan Act in 2021 — allocated to stimulate the national economy after the Covid-19 pandemic — it spent the following few years allocating that money to the likes of the Howard Mohr Community Center for a new air conditioning unit, the fire station to replace the roof and an ambulance, and the Forest Park Chamber of Commerce and Development’s marketing efforts.
The village committed $120,000 from ARPA funds to the Chamber, or $40,000 annually for three years. The village has approved $100,000 for the Chamber, dispersed $80,0000, and there was a $20,000 payment being held pending a presentation by the Chamber as a requirement to receive the ARPA funds. The last $20,000 payment request will be made in March.
Upcoming Chamber marketing efforts for September to February include designing content for an I-290 billboard to promote Forest Park. After searching for years, the Chamber found a contract for the billboard company’s agreement with the village that grants Forest Park seven hours a month, or 84 hours a year, of free promotional advertisements.
Since last year, the Chamber has been talking with ESPN about developing a radio marketing campaign with four Forest Park businesses for ESPN 1000-AM radio. Over nine weeks, ESPN would air 261 commercials for partner businesses and broad Forest Park messaging at the cost of $6,000 from the Chamber and over $3,500 from each participating business.
“The cost of the campaign is reasonable, but for both the marketing budget and partner businesses, it’s a considerable investment,” Kokenes told the Review. “But we think there’s value in reaching the ESPN audience, and now that summer is over, we’re going to revisit it.” At the council meeting, Kokenes suggested investing more marketing funds to make the partnership more affordable for businesses.
The Chamber is also aiming to post more on social media and continue accessing influencer and blog content.
“Social media consistently ranks as high priority due to its ability to provide a sense of opportunities to increase visibility, drive brand awareness and traffic, and reach targeted audiences, even as specific as their hobbies and their geographical location,” Kokenes said. “We’ve seen some amazing results and our audience continues to grow. Blogs promoted on social media, videos, influencer reels, etc. continue to produce great results and we learn something new every day.”
Kokenes said the Chamber is also partnering with Forest Park resident Ian Pfaff, who created the Arts Alliance’s Little Perspectives installation earlier this year. For a low cost, Pfaff is shooting video interviews with local business owners for the Chamber to use to promote Forest Park. Businesses will get to keep individual videos to use to promote themselves.
The Chamber will keep using marketing funds to create a new version of the welcome book that it gives to about 3,000 new residents in Oak Park, River Forest and Forest Park every year. The Chamber previously printed an actual booklet but is saving money by giving out postcards with QR codes that link to a digital version of the book.
After a benefactor funded a renovation of the Chamber’s website, in the last year or so, the Chamber has added pages to promote Forest Park, blogs to promote businesses and increased performance through SEO optimization. The Chamber plans to reserve some marketing funding for additional updates to the website.
“We’re working on our website to ensure that all the traffic we drive there for the blogs and other promotions can be easily found and quickly viewed by the consumer,” Kokenes said.
Kokenes added that the Chamber is planning to host an on-site Small Business Saturday event and a photo event during the holidays. It’s also working on a potential ice sculpture project with the Arts Alliance for the winter.
Kokenes said the Chamber wants to put on more summer events, ideally monthly on Madison Street, but would need a planning committee to help put on monthly events.
“Summer events were a little tough with weather and resources,” Kokenes said. The Chamber planned the Dog Days of Summer in July, but it got cancelled because of weather. Other monthly ideas include a small concert in Constitution Court or a Taste of Forest Park with food sold in front of restaurants.
Following Kokenes’ presentation, Commissioner Jessica Voogd asked if the Chamber had collected feedback from businesses to see if there was a way to measure return on the village’s investment in marketing.
“It would be great to work with the businesses to figure out a way to start to see the return on investment or get their feedback on sort of a regular basis after events, or even if they’re willing to let us compare month over month or year over year as it relates to events,” Voogd said.
“We can definitely discuss that,” Kokenes responded. “Maybe we need to think about, whether it’s events or whatever, what ways do we get people directly into a business, and how can we measure that?”
