What we do
To fulfill our mission we undertake a number of activities.
SPCVB markets San Pedro as a destination through regular contact with travel agents, directly with potential visitors, with meeting planners, and others who can influence people coming to San Pedro.
We work with the cruise lines to encourage them to bring their ships to San Pedro and to inform passengers about the range of activities available before and after their cruises and during port calls.
The organization maintains a web site so that people can quickly and easily access information about San Pedro, including preferred merchants and restaurants, and special offers. Our site, www.SanPedroTourist.net, has a wide range of information about the town, activities, events, including an extensive events calendar, photos, and other information designed to encourage people to visit and help them plan their stays here. We also have information useful to those planning meetings, along with news of interest about tourism in San Pedro.
SPCVB has a great presence on Facebook with pages tailored to events with an ongoing calendar listing, a page that has specialized information for people before and after their cruise, one with information about the Visitor Center, and one for general information on the convention and visitors bureau and its work. We also have a page for Team San Pedro, our volunteer team. The objective is to reach people with the information they need.
We work with our member organizations and companies to help them enhance the effectiveness of their marketing efforts with special promotions, publicity, and outreach.
But there’s much more to what SPCVB does besides marketing.
We provide a variety of tourism-related services to visitors and meeting planners. We are the first and main point of contact for visitors through the San Pedro Visitor Center at 225 West Sixth Street, Downtown.
It is also the key entity that serves the needs of visitors, meetings, and reunions during their trip planning and while they’re in San Pedro.
SPCVB takes the lead on greeting and making visitors feel welcome for events. We help the community respond to the great number of visitors and ensure that San Pedro gains maximum return from the business they brought to our town.
We’re the people who make events in and trips to San Pedro happen. SPCVB is not a travel agency; rather, it is a destination marketing and management organization.
 
That encompasses a wide range of products and services. In the meeting realm, SPCVB does everything from arranging for ground transportation, tours, and guides to staffing registration, arranging dinners, finding speakers. Whatever it takes for a meeting to be successful, SPCVB is ready, willing, and able to meet the need. We work with hotels, restaurants, and other supplies to ensure that San Pedro has the facilities and trained personnel to meet the needs of the meeting planners and their attendees.
The San Pedro Visitor Center is our hub of operations and the most important point of contact for visitors. It is conveniently located between the Crowne Plaza Hotel and Enterprise Rent-a-Car, just a block from the Los Angeles Maritime Museum and Downtown Marina.
The Center stocks information on our member businesses and organizations, special offers and discounts, has maps available, and—most important—has our volunteers to answer visitor questions on what to see, where to go, what to do. We also have a variety of San Pedro-related souvenirs available for purchase, including post cards, magnets, and t-shirts.
 
For individual and group travelers, we work to ensure that they know San Pedro is a safe, inviting town and that its businesses cater to their needs. We provide the most comprehensive visitor event calendar in the area, guides, and information services. We develop promotions and specials to make sure visitors have every reason to stay in San Pedro and to stay here once they’ve arrived. That is, we want them to find the attractions and services they need right here and not have to venture outside the Harbor area.
Many people ask us how we fit in with the Chamber of Commerce, the Los Angeles Convention Board, and other organizations. The answer is that we are independent, but we strive to work with every organization we can. There is certainly more than enough work to go around. We are, however, the only organization that is fully dedicated to promoting tourism in San Pedro. The Chamber promotes San Pedro, but has many responsibilities beyond tourism; the LA convention board promotes tourism, but has many responsibilities beyond San Pedro.
So we are the ones who have taken on the responsibility for attracting people to this town and making them feel welcome, attending to their needs, while they are here. And we hope they will tell their friends about San Pedro and encourage them to visit us.
And we do that primarily through the work of our volunteers.
Certainly, we are busy getting the word out about San Pedro as a destination and preparing publications so that once people are here we can inform them of the events going on and the businesses they will want to patronize.
But the main interaction with those visitors comes about by our volunteers. They are the ones who make people truly feel welcome and truly informed about our community and what there is to do here. They are the ones with the first-hand expert knowledge of what to do and see. And so you are on the front line of making San Pedro the friendly destination.