Page 107 - Innovation Delaware 2018

The Greater Wilmington Convention & Visitors Bureau has made major upgrades to its online presence, which now allows members to update information about events 24/7. The organization has also embraced the trend of user-generated content, using #VISITWILM to help potential visitors experience a location through the eyes of other tourists.
Brewpubs, breweries, wineries and distilleries continue to attract both locals and visitors who want local flavor in a distinctive setting. Visit Delaware’s Beer, Wine & Spirits
HAGLEY MUSEUM & LIBRARY
Trail invites visitors to travel across the state to 30 breweries, wineries, distilleries, cideries and meaderies. (As of 2016, Delaware was home to 19 craft breweries, which together generated $318 million in economic impact, according to the Brewers Association.)
No matter whether they’re going to a museum, a restaurant or a winery, visitors see good memories as a return on their investment. Businesses in Delaware’s hospitality and tourism industry are determined to provide it. ID
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Brews program with reduced admission from 5 p.m. to
8 p.m. on Wednesdays. A partnership with Dogfish Head Craft Brewery, which supplies the beer, the evenings have attracted up to 600 people
for each event. “It’s a casual, relaxing experience,” says JESSICA EISENBREY, Hagley’s marketing manager. “People are reacting in a positive way.” For summer 2018, Hagley will also sell ice cream from Hockessin-based Woodside Farm Creamery.
Hagley’s periodic Sunday Strolls let visitors wander the property or take a guided tour.
The museum plans to up the frequency of the promotion, during which the café is open for breakfast and lunch. This year, the museum will start garden tours with dinner at the café.
Special events have always been a draw. Hagley’s Maker Fest in April is part science fair, part community fair
and part artisan fest. From tech enthusiasts to crafters to science clubs, participants come to the event to show what they’ve made and learned.
Tourists typically come from the mid-Atlantic area,
Eisenbrey says. She’d like
to broaden the reach, and a traveling exhibit to China is a step in that direction.
In March 2018, Hagley and Tsinghua University
in Beijing mounted the traveling exhibition “Spirit
of Invention: Nineteenth- Century U.S. Patent Models from the Hagley Museum and Library.”
Hagley has the world’s largest private collection of patent models, which were part of the patent application process in the 1800s.
Regardless of whether the invention was a clock or an
artificial leg, inventors had to submit a scaled-down model — until, that is, the Patent Office became crowded
with models and nixed the requirement.
Only about 60 of Hagley’s nearly 5,000 models are in China. Within the next few years, more of the models
will be displayed on the grounds, and by 2020, Hagley will feature patent model exhibits on all three floors of a renovated visitors center.
“We really want them to tell the story of innovation and invention over time,” Eisenbrey says. ID
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