This Sacramento influencer shows you don’t need to leave town to have fun | Opinion

Last week, a riverboat cruise company offering luxury rides on the Sacramento River for tickets between $6,000 and $12,000 scrapped the watery venture after just four trips.

For some, it was yet another sign that Sacramento’s tourism economy struggles to compete in a false competition with the state’s larger and better-known cities like San Francisco and Los Angeles, which, respectively, drew in $7.4 billion and $34.5 billion in tourism last year to Sacramento’s $2.1 billion.

Opinion

The ill-fated river cruise was originally supposed to leave from San Francisco Bay, and Old Sacramento only became the replacement when the company couldn’t come to business terms with the San Francisco Port Authority.

Also, it was entitled “Napa Valley River Cruises,” despite there being no river I know of connecting Napa and Old Sac.

Far too often, Sacramento is billed as an attraction only because of its proximity to other, “better” places. How many times have you heard some variation of “only two hours from the Bay, and two hours from the mountains”?

Sacramento has been fighting and losing that battle for decades, and I think it’s time to stop. No one wants a glossy, $6,000 boat ride down our river. We want to see Sacramento celebrated for what it has to offer now, in 2023 — and that’s much more than you might think.

Sacramento seen her way

Consider the (often-unpaid) work of Maddy Eccles, a 34-year-old, Sacramento-based social media influencer whose videos on Instagram and TikTok highlighting the city are all anyone in my social circles seem to be talking about.

She’s far from the only influencer Sac can boast of, but Eccles seems to have hit local consciousness in a new way lately, and several of her videos have gone viral with more than a million views. She uses her platform to reach an audience of 25- to 45-year-olds who see Sacramento not as a jumping off point to other locations, but as a city to be proud of in its own right.

Eccles’ recent videos feature businesses like Midtown Spirits’ boozy slushies for hot summer days; local sights like the the “purple palace” on P Street; regular events like First Fridays on R Street or Second Saturdays in Midtown; the Citizen Hotel for a treat-yourself staycation; and even a shockingly great wine selection at an ampm in Elk Grove.

She also blends local humor into her videos, like when she touched on the special brand of torture that is the downtown freeway interchange, or talked about how the city’s heat index could rival Satan’s sweaty armpit in the summertime. Her comment sections are filled with people who say they’re grateful for her videos and had no idea there were so many fun things going on in our area.

“It’s an underrated city,” Eccles told me. “People have lived their whole lives here, and they grew up thinking Sacramento was a cow town and there’s nothing to do, but now there’s so much.”

Eccles, a San Diegan by birth who moved to Sacramento from Texas nearly five years ago, created the #BeginnersGuideToSac on her blog, but says her posts on social media didn’t really take off until the pandemic when people were looking for ways to get out of their house.

Now, she focuses more on video content, has more than 100,000 followers across multiple platforms, was recently hired as an independent contractor with Visit California and is trying to make a full-time career out of promoting Sacramento.

“Sacramento is very possessive about their community,” she said. “I think that it’s a big town that feels like a small town. I can walk down the street and run into people I know, but I can also easily talk to business owners and chefs.”

A different side of the city

Sacramento often gets a bad rap for being “boring,” but Eccles uses her pages to showcase a different side of the city, one that’s bursting with events and businesses catering to a younger demographic. It’s hardly curated and only barely edited, Eccles told me, but her Millennial and Gen Z audience prefers that.

“I just want to be as authentic as possible,” Eccles said. “I think that content that looks too much like an ad is a turn off. It’s more entertaining and easier to watch when it’s a real person, not a paid actor.”

So when you see the news that this city can’t hold onto a luxury river cruise, stop and consider the facts: That exorbitantly priced voyage was never about highlighting what Sacramento has to offer, it was an East Coast-based company appealing to wealthy consumers that have too much cash to burn.

Young Sacramentans aren’t impressed by costly, luxury experiences or the city’s proximity to “better” locations. We have less money than ever in our pockets and we want to love the city we live in. We’ve spent too much of our youth cooped up inside and we’re ready to bust out; meet us on our level and we’ll show Sac the love.

(And hey, if you want a riverboat ride, you can get one for $30 with a full bar. See you there?)