Defending WHHSH - and wondering why

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority is in a bind over whether to defend its trademark on "What Happens Here Stays Here," according to a Benjamin Spillman piece in today's Review-Journal. Apparently they've spent $732,123 doing so already and Mayor Oscar Goodman, chairman of the LVCVA board, thinks it's probably a better idea if they just give it up already. And he's right. Very right.

Look, the phrase is already now married in the world's consciousness to Vegas which is, in and of itself, an amazing feat since it existed long before it was applied to the city. What, is Rockford, Ill., going to start using it? They'll look stupid. (OK, it's Rockford, so they'll look MORE stupid.) No other tourism destination or attraction is going to bother just as Ford's not going to use "Heartbeat of America" even if they could. The LVCVA ought to count themselves lucky that the WHHSH phrase wasn't yet being abused by someone else when they happened upon it and just enjoy all the echo-chamber usages as furtherance of the campaign. It might be different if someone had had some foresight to market official LVCVA merchandise with the logo, but nobody did and that's that.

While we're at it, though, something funny from my mail today. I got some info from San Diego wanting me to come write a travel story about the city. And I was reminded of how challenging it is to come up with a tourism slogan when I saw the god-awful clunker that they use:

"San Diego: 365 Days of Ahhhhhhh."

Here's an article on how they came up with that.

Makes it sound like a daily visit to the dentist. And yes, I counted. Seven "h"s. Oh, and they trademarked it. Which is a waste when your slogan is so ridiculous.