Instead of “Fun Sized,” “Cooler & Warmer,” and “All That” how about “Loves to Waste Money”?

Rhode Island can’t adequately fund public transit, environmental enforcement, and public education — all of which would help make the Ocean State easier to explore, healthier, and smarter — but it has no problem paying advertising firms and marketing companies for corny phrases, a confusing logo, and silly tourism campaigns.

Rhode Island Commerce even commissioned the creation of two Styrofoam quahogs, at the cost of $38,000 apiece, plus whatever it cost to truck the 200-pound stuffies and their accompanying 8-foot-tall bottles of hot sauce from coast to coast.

The unappetizing seafood sculptures (no offense to the artist, because it was an impossible task) featured barcodes encouraging tourists to enter to win a trip to Rhode Island, where they likely presumed we enjoy smashing baked potatoes into seashells and washing it down with hot sauce.

Rhode Island Commerce’s chief marketing officer told WPRI that the stuffies spent nearly three months traveling the country, stopping at four major airports along their adventure. The last stop was in December at Los Angeles International Airport. The stuffies also visited Atlanta, Baltimore, and Detroit.

She also noted that one of the Styrofoam leviathans was paraded around on a glass truck that passed through 10 East Coast cities.

I realize I’m a curmudgeon, but come on. We can’t effectively bus local residents to Ocean State beaches but we can send two giant pieces of Styrofoam on vacation.

The traveling quahogs made the Cooler & Warmer catastrophe look like a brilliant idea. That 2016 marketing failure featured a video that included footage from Iceland. Also, nobody knew or knows what Cooler & Warmer means. That mystery at least made the campaign more interesting than those two petroleum-based stuffies.

Then-Gov. Gina Raimondo tried to explain, tweeting that the motto “is what RI is all about — an enticing, openhearted place to live, work and visit.”

Within days, the Cooler & Warmer backlash forced the resignation of the state’s chief marketing officer. And Raimondo responded by saying the head-scratching slogan would be scrapped but the logo — a white sail — would remain. She encouraged businesses to make the sail theirs by putting their logos in the white space.

That sound you heard was $550,000 in taxpayer money being flushed down the toilet. You heard the same sound when state officials decided last year to swap out Rhode Island’s license plates for no reason.

“Loves to Waste Money” isn’t catchy, but it’s true.

Two years later, Cooler & Warmer was replaced by Fun Sized. This campaign featured people rock climbing and kayaking. State officials claimed the videos were all shot in Rhode Island. This 2018 marketing strategy cost nearly $1 million.

The fun ended this year, as the state recently unveiled a new marketing campaign, All That.

“This new campaign will ensure that travelers know that whatever they are looking for in their next trip, Rhode Island is ‘All That,’” Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos said in a press release announcing the waste of $482,000 in taxpayer money.

All That … traffic because state officials fail to property fund and support public transit. While you are here, make sure to visit Alviti Bridge, where, while stuck in traffic, you can stare at another bridge sticking straight in the air.

The nearly half-million-dollar All That campaign is part of a $2.2 million contract the state signed last June with the Florida-based consulting firm The Zimmerman Agency for advertising work.

The state and its municipalities need funding to: maintain and repair infrastructure (I hear there is a crumbling bridge that is causing more than 10- to 15-minute delays); protect drinking water supplies; better manage stormwater runoff, so our beaches aren’t closed to swimming as often; prepare communities for climate change; modernize the power grid to accommodate more renewable energy; and build more affordable housing, to name just a few other priorities.

A well-run state would be able to address those quality-of-life issues and marketing at the same time. Rhode Island is not such a place. For instance, the state has an appalling lack of affordable housing but Rhode Island Commerce seems more interested in subsidizing luxury living. Lawmakers talk about the need, but then blame a lack of funding. Meanwhile, the crisis worsens and the cost of fixing the problem — if that truly is the aim — only increases.

Rhode Island spends a significant chunk of tax revenue funding regional tourism councils. Perhaps that money could be put to better use. Tourism is obviously important, but so too is properly caring for and addressing the needs of Rhode Islanders. A healthy population and environment would provide a wonderful boost to the economy.


The state’s five regional tourism councils were originally created in the 1980s to drive tourism revenue. They are largely funded by the state’s 6% hotel tax rate — off the top, 1% goes to the municipality where the lodging facility is located. The remaining 5% is distributed thusly: 45% to the local tourism council; 25% to the municipality where the accommodation is located; 25% to Rhode Island Commerce; and 5% to the Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Discover Newport is the local tourism council for Newport and Bristol counties. It, like the other tourism councils, is essentially a government-supported marketing agency with a sizable budget. For the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2023, Discover Newport reported $5,823,728 in revenue. It reported investing $4.5 million in sales and marketing efforts.

The Dis­cover Newport umbrella also includes the Newport Hotel Collection, authorized by the Newport City Council to get $1 a room per night from sales by City-by-the-Sea hotels with 18 or more rooms. The Collection’s purpose is to increase the use of hotel rooms for its mem­bers, and, either directly or indirectly, is behind the push for ever more hotel development. The Collection invested another $211,000 in sales and marketing efforts, according to Dis­cover Newport.

While nearly half of the state’s hotel tax revenue is used to pay tourism council salaries, rent, advertising campaigns, marketing strategies, and consultants and to buy foam monstrosities and stock Icelandic footage, in many of the communities where they are based, such as Newport, municipal re­sources are strained, low-paid hospitality/service industry workers can’t afford rent, and the proliferation of second homes is jacking up housing costs.

The median listing home price in Newport is $1.5 million. The average Newport home value is $804,730, up 6.2% over the past year. You better be a tourist, because who can afford to live there?

Here are the 2022 revenues reported by the state’s four other tourism councils: Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau, $4,084,659; South County Tourism Council, $2,008,589; Blackstone Valley Tourism Council, $2.82 million; and the Block Island Tourism Council, $537,785.

There are more important things hotel tax revenues could be used for other than to fund five regional tourism councils, plus a commerce corporation, for a state that is 48 miles long, 37 miles wide, and has only 39 cities and towns — and you have to admit some aren’t high on people’s places to visit even if an airport stuffie forces a double take.

Note: The only two state tourism slogans I can recall are “Virginia is for Lovers” and “Make It In Massachusetts.” Neither worked. I’ve only been to Virginia twice, and I was born and raised in Massachusetts.

Frank Carini can be reached at [email protected]. His opinions don’t reflect those of ecoRI News.