Dave Santucci is the new vice president of marketing for the Chattanooga Convention and Visitors Bureau.DAVE SANTUCCIAge: 35Job title: Vice president of marketing Chattanooga Convention & Visitors BureauFamily: He and his wife, Kourtney, have two sons, Jack, 3 and Liam, 5 monthsCareer: CNN science, technology and space producer, Georgia Aquarium vice president of marketing, ran his own marketing service, Signal MultimediaEducation: Bachelors degree in political and environmental science from Emory University
Dave Santucci’s followed the call of the wild his whole life.
He went to Emory University with dreams of becoming an environmental lawyer. He met his wife at the school’s outdoor club. He fell in love with TV production after an internship with CNN’s environmental unit.
And as of three weeks ago, he’s in charge of marketing what Outdoor magazine called the best town ever.
“It’s always been a passion of mine,” Santucci said. “This position, it couldn’t be a better match.”
The father of two said he sees no end in sight for Chattanooga’s growth, and he’s excited to be at a job where he gets to nurture that growth.
As vice president of marketing for the Chattanooga Convention and Visitors Bureau, Santucci is responsible for drawing people to the county. He pays close attention to trends in the area — rowing during Head of the Hooch, music at the Riverbend Festival — and targets his marketing money toward groups with shared interests.
Traditionally, the bureau aimed its efforts at major markets a couple of hours away. Atlanta, Nashville and Knoxville residents always have been keen to drive down the highway to the Scenic City, but Santucci said he wants to widen the effort.
Chattanooga is a beautiful place, he said, and he wants to share with people outside the traditional tourism market the aspects of the city that brought him and his wife here a few years ago.
After working for seven years at CNN, Santucci took the Georgia Aquarium’s public relations director job when the attraction opened. There, he was able to travel the world, creating marketing material on the aquarium’s inhabitants from exotic locales across the globe.
But when his wife, a pediatric specialist, got a job at Erlanger hospital, he left his job to follow her north and start his own multimedia company.
The two had been up to Chattanooga before for romantic weekends, but it was tough to tell if happiness and, perhaps more importantly with 1-year-old child, work waited for him.
“It was a leap of faith,” he said. “We knew we loved Chattanooga as a city. We didn’t know if we would love living here.”
But both work and happiness were in store for Santucci. He loves his North Shore home and soon started picking up projects for the Convention & Visitors Bureau. Before long, he was working 30 hours a week for the group.
Bob Doak, the bureau’s president and chief executive officer, said he could tell from the start Santucci was a man he wanted working for him. So when the bureau’s old marketing head moved on to another city, Doak didn’t need to look hard for a replacement.
“It was a perfect match to put Dave in that position,” Doak said. “He has fit right in from day one.”
Santucci said he hopes to help more people find their fit in Chattanooga. He loves promoting the outdoor attractions he’s always loved, but he’s trying to highlight additional attractions that outsiders often don’t know about. As he and his wife found, the city can be a great romantic getaway. He also wants to capitalize on Tennessee’s reputation as a music state, selling travelers on Chattanooga’s growing music scene.
“We’re rising to new levels as a city, as a destination,” he said. “I want to highlight the coolness to Chattanooga.”
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