The Little Town That Could

I keep telling people, “I couldn't lift a car by myself. But if enough of us got together and lifted – that car will rise almost effortlessly!” And they nod in agreement since it's a well-known fact.

In a minute I'm going to ask you to help lift Lake Wales from the comfort of your own home. It’ll be as easy as sending an email or watching a movie.

So, what could help a little downtown like Lake Wales in these tough economic times? How can we get attention that could bring visitors to spend money, invest money, and create new jobs that will help our local economy? 

How about national news coverage of a very positive story? How about international coverage available 24 hours a day without cease? What kind of story about a small town could capture the imagination of America and beyond? 

It would have to be real and honest, a grassroots effort. Not a slick corporate ad campaign. We've already seen enough glitzy TV commercials that we want to fast-forward through. Technology is big in the news so it wouldn't hurt if the story had a tech angle too.

Most of all, it would need to be unique and have heart-warming appeal. Reporters in TV, radio, print and online search for the big story and breaking news, but what makes any story newsworthy and memorable is the human interest angle.

It's extremely tough to find something interesting that no one else is doing. We found it!

Quite a few downtowns have a video overview of the community or event videos. However, no other town in America has over twenty videos about the profit and nonprofit businesses, civic groups, churches, city government, sites of interest, the people and the history of the community. We're adding more to the Lake Wales Main Street Virtual Tour every week with a goal of over a hundred.

That's new and different, all right, but that's not the story. In the end, it will not be the videos that gain national attention. They're only the wheels, not the engine. No, the real story, the engine, is the human interest angle: how a small town pulled together to promote each other.

Big corporations have spent millions in pursuit of the coveted “viral video.”  That's a video with a lot of hits and people email the link to their friends. Corporations know it gets people talking nation-wide. They use YouTube.com because it's free and available 24 hours a day, around the world!

Here's where the lifting comes in. We're asking you to go to LakeWalesMainStreet.com and click on Virtual Tour. Everyone pulling together will be evident in the number of times the videos are watched, rated and the number of comments on the video page. If you subscribe to the Lake Wales Main Street Channel, you'll get an email when new videos are added.

All across America people volunteer to pull weeds, plant trees, pick up trash and paint downtown because they love their community. Can you spend a few minutes watching videos, rating, writing comments on the YouTube page and emailing the link to your friends?

I believe Lake Wales is the little town that could. I believe that if each of us does a little something, we could do something big.