{"id":146215,"date":"2026-03-23T19:25:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T19:25:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/146215\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T19:25:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T19:25:11","slug":"does-pittsburgh-have-a-perception-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/146215\/","title":{"rendered":"Does Pittsburgh Have a Perception Problem?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Forge<\/a><\/p>\n

PHOTO BY OLLIE GRATZINGER<\/p>\n

Leaders at VisitPITTSBURGH, the city\u2019s tourism nonprofit, announced a new leisure campaign designed to draw visitors in, positioning the Steel City as a \u201cdestination where industrial grit has been reborn as wonder.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Forge On campaign was officially unveiled Monday at the organization\u2019s annual meeting. At a press event ahead of the meeting, Emily Hatfield, VisitPITTSBURGH\u2019s vice president of marketing and communications, called the campaign a \u201crally cry\u201d for the city.<\/p>\n

\u201cPittsburgh owns grit. There\u2019s no other destination that really has grit in the way that we do,\u201d Hatfield says. \u201cThat\u2019s what we\u2019re known for. We\u2019re known as this industrial city.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The campaign will focus not only on Pittsburgh\u2019s industrial heritage and \u201cgrit,\u201d but also the \u201clift\u201d the city has experienced over the last decade or so.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The grit, organizers say, comes from Pittsburgh\u2019s industrial legacy as a leader in steel manufacturing, and the lift comes from the hyperlocal presence of new businesses, arts initiatives and popular festivals, as well as the national spotlight that comes with hosting the 2026 NFL Draft in April.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople already associate Pittsburgh with grit [and] with bridges, but \u2026 once people come here, they\u2019re surprised about everything else that Pittsburgh has to offer,\u201d Hatfield says.<\/p>\n

The theme of the Forge On campaign can be summed up in two words: expansion and unification.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a world class product,\u201d Hatfield says of Pittsburgh. \u201cBut we\u2019re kind of stuck \u2026 with a perception and awareness problem. Pittsburghers love Pittsburgh, but the way we talk about Pittsburgh is fragmented. It\u2019s different. If we\u2019re not all singing from the same songbook, our message is lost.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hatfield cites research conducted by VisitPITTSBURGH last year, which surveyed 3,000 respondents and included Madden Media-led focus groups involving nearly 50 Pittsburgh visitor industry partners. The study identified a critical \u201cawareness gap\u201d among prospective travelers. It shows that among those who haven\u2019t visited Pittsburgh, only a small percentage are familiar with the city\u2019s tourism assets. Half state that their reason for not visiting the Steel City boils down to the fact that it simply is not on their radar.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The study also found that among past visitors, 72.8% find the city appealing, and nearly half agree that it is a \u201ccity on the rise.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Forge On was developed around the idea of evoking a sense of wonder, surprise and discovery. Previous campaigns focused exclusively on the city\u2019s past, but one of Forge On\u2019s four strategic shifts aims to reposition Pittsburgh from a place of history to a destination that is in constant creation. While Forge On will not abandon the city\u2019s historical narrative, Hatfield adds that it is vital to tell the story of the city\u2019s present and the future, too.<\/p>\n

Similarly, the campaign\u2019s objective will be not only to support existing Pittsburgh tourism markets \u2014 Philadelphia, Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, Washington D.C., New York City and regional Pennsylvania towns such as Wilkes-Barre and Scranton \u2014 but also to expand into additional markets such as Buffalo, Detroit, Chicago and Atlanta.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to meet travelers when they\u2019re in that early phase of discovery. We want to make sure that Pittsburgh is top-of-mind,\u201d Hatfield says.<\/p>\n

Hatfield also hopes the campaign will encourage more people to visit Pittsburgh for the first time; a 2025 study by VisitPITTSBURGH shows that 83% of folks who visit the city have been here before. The Forge On campaign, which will specifically target new visitors, aims to increase visibility and galvanize a message of resurgence that officials hope will increase first-time visitation while continuing to inspire the city\u2019s loyal base of repeat day trippers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a really strong repeat visitor rate. People come here, they fall in love, and they come back,\u201d Hatfield says. \u201cBut what we have to do if we\u2019re ever going to move the needle in terms of visitation and economic impact \u2014 which are VisitPITTSBURGH\u2019s two north star objectives \u2014 we have to bring new visitors into the bundle. We want to bring new travelers in, have them fall in love, and help us grow that statistic even more.\u201d<\/p>\n

Folks will start to experience VisitPITTSBURGH\u2019s new campaign through billboards and social media, as well as advertisements on TV and streaming services. Hatfield adds that VisitPITTSBURGH will soon be expanding its presence in D.C. through a \u201cstation domination\u201d takeover, with the Metro Center decorated in Pittsburgh-inspired advertising.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe campaign positioned Pittsburgh as one of the original \u2018maker\u2019 cities and invites audiences to continue making with us,\u201d reads a press release from VisitPITTSBURGH.<\/p>\n

It is a sentiment echoed by Jerad Bachar, president and CEO of VisitPITTSBURGH.<\/p>\n

\u201cPittbsurgh was built on the fire of an industrial era and the grit that shaped champions, but our legacy was never just about steel,\u201d Bachar says in a statement. \u201cIt has always been about resilience and creativity. This campaign is our new north star; it is a rally cry that honors our DNA while celebrating the new energy, flavors and ideas that make our city so inspiring today.\u201d\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOTO BY OLLIE GRATZINGER Leaders at VisitPITTSBURGH, the city\u2019s tourism nonprofit, announced a new leisure campaign designed to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":146216,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[66695,10686,2341,73,75,74,8445],"class_list":{"0":"post-146215","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh","8":"tag-forge-on","9":"tag-marketing","10":"tag-media","11":"tag-pittsburgh","12":"tag-pittsburgh-headlines","13":"tag-pittsburgh-news","14":"tag-visitpittsburgh"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=146215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146215\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/146216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=146215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}