Nevada Development Authority targets California businesses

The Nevada Development Authority appreciates shock value.

But the local economic development nonprofit -- which once told highly taxed California businesspeople to "bend over and kiss your assets goodbye" -- aims for a different sort of surprise these days.

The authority's latest Golden State ad campaign features shots of playgrounds, university labs, food banks and suburban office parks. The ads also include local celebrities and well-known businesspeople, including Wayne Newton and Zappos.com CEO Tony Hsieh, talking about why they love living and working in Las Vegas.

"That's the shock effect -- to see that real people live here and do all the normal things that normal people do," said Somer Hollingsworth, the authority's president and CEO. "People just don't know what we're about in the business sector. A lot of them believe 'The Hangover' is really Las Vegas."

The ads are set to air starting today on cable television in Southern California. Hollingsworth said the campaign is a new direction for the authority, which grabbed national headlines for previous campaigns comparing Golden State lawmakers to chimpanzees and redrawing the California flag without its trademark bear, which presumably left for friendlier tax environs.

Today's launch isn't the group's first soft sell; testimonial ads featuring California transplants appeared in regional business publications in the spring. But it is the first campaign featuring celebrities, and it's airing on TV for broader reach. Other notables participating include Strip entertainer Terry Fator, University of Nevada, Las Vegas President Neal Smatresk, Applied Analysis Principal Jeremy Aguero and restaurateur Rick Moonen.

Moonen relocated from New York to Las Vegas seven years ago to open RM Seafood inside Mandalay Bay. He said Las Vegas is his hometown now, so he jumped at the chance to promote the business community.

"They approached me about doing a 20-second spot called 'The Real Las Vegas.' It was like, 'My God, thank you,' " said Moonen, whose ad promotes the Three Square food bank. "Vegas is now legitimate. I love being part of the growth and building of a real community. The city is broadening, and it's exciting to participate in that."

APPEALING TO PROFESSIONALS

Terry Shonkwiler, president of campaign creator Shonkwiler Partners Advertising in Las Vegas, said the new approach might appeal more to professionals.

"We want businesspeople to be able to relate to it," Shonkwiler said. "We're speaking their language. They can understand businesspeople who are talking about why they've been successful, and that may resonate with someone who needs a bit of a push to think about relocating here."

The initiative also comes on the heels of the 2011 Legislature, which featured tough talk about economic development. Legislators including Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford, D-Las Vegas, criticized the development authority for its marketing efforts. Horsford said he resented pushing a low-tax message amid cuts in education funding.

"We decided that, as long as they weren't enthralled with the old approach, we might as well go ahead and become a thousand points of light," Hollingsworth said. "We've got a nice campaign going on, and it's not a campaign California can get upset over."

SKEPTICISM OVER CAMPAIGN

Nor is it a campaign that will goad legions of Californians into moving, said Barbara Hayes, president and CEO of the Sacramento Area Commerce & Trade Organization.

"I'm sure the ads will be very well-done, but companies don't make decisions about moving because Wayne Newton is in a commercial," Hayes said.

Rather, they weigh business costs and workforce availability. Building long-term relationships is also crucial to relocation recruiting, Hayes said. Besides, authority ad campaigns up until now haven't forced an exodus of California businesses into Nevada, she said.

Numbers from the Nevada Commission on Economic Development show six California businesses were among the 27 companies that opened new operations in Southern Nevada in fiscal 2011, which ended June 30. With four companies, Canada had almost as many local transplants (Hollingsworth said the authority is considering a campaign up north as well).

CONTROVERSY BROUGHT FREE PUBLICITY

Still, it's the authority's job to call attention to business in Las Vegas. Hollingsworth acknowledged that could be tougher without the $15 million in free publicity the group's more controversial campaigns generated, with stories in the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, Time magazine and ABC News. The ads even caught the eye of the California Legislature's Revenue and Taxation Committee, which studied the spots in 2008 during a discussion about how the state's tax policy could drive away businesses.

"This will not bring the leveraged media (attention) that we're used to, but we think we can spin it pretty well," Hollingsworth said. The strident approach is on the back burner for the foreseeable future, he added.

"I want to see how this works. We're really going to analyze this over the next six months," he said. "We'll see how it's doing, and change it up with more people. Looking at the demographics and the reach, we really feel it's going to work."

Hollingsworth declined to disclose the marketing campaign's cost.

Contact reporter Jennifer Robison at jrobison@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-4512.