There’s a certain kind of destination that doesn’t need better food or better wine or a better story. It just needs someone to finally show up and tell that story the right way.

Lodi, California is one of those places.

When Visit Lodi — the city’s Conference & Visitors Bureau — reached out about a multi-day food and tourism photography campaign, I arrived with curiosity and left completely won over.

Over the course of nearly three full days, I photographed 13 distinct locations: restaurants, wineries, a historic Victorian inn, a beloved brewhouse, an artisan bakery, a family goat farm at golden hour — and came home with an image library that has since been deployed across web, social media, and advertising.

Several images went viral. Visit Lodi continues to use this content time and again, and I think I know why.

The imagery works because Lodi is quietly, genuinely, surprisingly special — and it just needed a visual language to match.

Here’s a look inside the Visit Lodi Tourism Board campaign!

Why Tourism Photography Is a Strategic Investment, Not a Line Item

Before I walk you through the campaign itself, I want to speak directly to the marketing directors and tourism board leaders reading this. This is where the conversation gets interesting.

The question I hear most often is: “How do we get people to actually visit?”

The answer almost always has something to do with imagery and assets. People don’t book trips based on bullet points.

They book based on a feeling — and that feeling comes almost entirely from photography (or videography).

The images on your website, your Instagram feed, your hero banners, your advertising — those are your first impression, your pitch, and your promise, all at once. Or the ones they pinned to the Pinterest board, saved on TikTok, or Instagram.

What makes tourism photography different from a standard brand shoot is the scope and the stakes. You’re not selling one thing. You’re selling an entire place — its texture, its energy, its identity.

That requires a photographer who understands visual storytelling at scale, who can walk into a dimly lit bistro at 6pm or a sun-drenched vineyard at golden hour and walk out with images that make someone in another state pick up their phone and start looking at weekend getaways.

That’s exactly what this campaign was built to do.

About the Campaign: 13 Locations, 3 Days, One Cohesive Story

The brief from Visit Lodi was clear in its ambition: elevate the whole town with imagery that people want to share and tag their friends in.

Hero shots for the website. Scroll-stopping content for Instagram. Assets that each restaurant and winery could use across their own platforms.

What made this project stand out — and what I’d encourage any destination marketing organization to consider — was the comprehensive, multi-location approach. Rather than commissioning photography for a single venue, Visit Lodi committed to a campaign that covered the full breadth of what the destination has to offer.

The result is a cohesive visual library that tells a complete story.

Here’s a look at what we covered:

Ruby’s Bakery & Café

We kicked off Tuesday morning at 8am, and Ruby’s delivered immediately. The light coming through the windows was ideal, and the pastry case was full of things that made me want to stay all day. Buttery laminated croissants, caramelized sugar buns, a custard danish, pink-frosted sugar cookies — this is a bakery that punches well above its weight for a Central Valley town.

The Ruby’s images were immediately some of the most-shared from the campaign.

The croissant-and-coffee shot against the blue tile wall in particular took on a life of its own on social media — exactly the kind of image we set out to create.

MooMoo’s Burger Barn

A whimsical, family-owned 50s-style diner with genuine personality. Red checkered tablecloths, cow-print salt and pepper shakers, milkshakes in frosted glasses, and burgers that absolutely required two hands and a stack of napkins.

The key to shooting a place like MooMoo’s is leaning into the joy of it — not trying to make it something it isn’t. These images are unapologetically fun, and they work because of that.

Brickhouse

A family-owned Italian restaurant with a devoted local following and a menu built on serious comfort food. Short rib on polenta, coconut prawns, chicken Marsala — the kind of cooking where you recognize immediately that someone has been doing this for a long time and loves it.

Papapavlo’s Bistro & Bar

Papapavlo’s is a Mediterranean bistro with an outdoor plaza, fire pit, and enclosed patio — all of it with an energy that feels more like a private dinner party than a restaurant. Prime steaks, lobster, all-house-made desserts, and a tableside experience I was not expecting in Lodi.

The flaming saganaki shot is one of my absolute favorites from the campaign — it’s the kind of image that stops a scroll cold and makes you immediately want to know where this place is.

The Oxford Kitchen

London-inspired fare brought to the heart of Lodi. The Oxford Kitchen is one of those places that has absolutely no business being as cool as it is, and that tension is part of what makes it so charming. The red phone booth in the corner. The espresso martinis. The Beef Wellington. The cocktail program.

Lodi Beer Company

The historic district location of Lodi Beer Co. is pure atmosphere — ornate gold signage, dark wood bar, a menu that swings from fish and chips to deep-fried mac and cheese without losing its identity.

It’s the kind of place that’s been there forever and will be there forever, and the photos needed to capture that lived-in quality.

Acquiesce Winery

This image needs no explanation. Two bottles of Acquiesce held against a field of blooming yellow mustard flowers under a clear spring sky. I knew the moment I captured it that it would travel.

Acquiesce is a white and rosé-focused winery that’s earned national recognition — and these images absolutely reflect that quality.

Peltier Winery

Sun-drenched outdoor tastings, estate wines in branded glassware, and the kind of effortless afternoon that makes people start researching drive times from the Bay Area.

Calivines Winery & Olive Mill

A modern tasting room with clean lines and serious Zinfandel. This is the image that communicates Lodi’s wine credentials in a single frame: deep garnet, mid-pour, old vine.

Bokisch Vineyards

We ended the day at golden hour, and the light was extraordinary. The Bokisch shots are some of the most cinematic of the campaign — and arguably some of the best vineyard lifestyle images I’ve created anywhere.

Spenker Family Farm / Goodnight Goats

I didn’t know I needed this on the itinerary until I was there. Spenker Family Farm and the Goodnight Goats experience is the kind of unexpected gem that makes a destination feel full and dimensional.

Lodi Hill House Inn

The Lodi Hill House Inn is a beautifully preserved Victorian property where I stayed during the shoot. We captured the ornate front porch, the heirloom china and breakfast details, and the kind of morning-light moments that make you feel like you’ve stepped back in time — in the very best way.

Lodi’s Secret Weapon: 85+ Wineries and a Food Scene That Earns Its Own Trip

Here’s the thing about Lodi that most people outside the wine world don’t know: it’s home to over 85 wineries and is internationally recognized as the Zinfandel Capital of the World. Old vine Zin grapes here date back generations — some vines are over a century old. This is serious, serious wine country.

What makes Lodi compelling from a tourism marketing standpoint is that the food scene has grown up to match it.

You’ve got elevated bistro cooking at Zin and Papapavlo’s, London-inspired small plates at The Oxford Kitchen, beautifully executed Mediterranean fare, a craft beer scene anchored by Lodi Beer Co., artisan pastry at Ruby’s, and pastoral farm experiences that round out a destination weekend perfectly.

This is not a one-trick-pony wine town. It’s a full weekend — and the campaign was designed to show all of it.

What I Bring to a Tourism Campaign (That Goes Beyond the Camera)

I’ve spent years working at the intersection of travel, hospitality, and visual storytelling.

Before focusing full-time on commercial photography, I spent several years as Blog & Content Manager for one of Forbes’ Top 10 Travel Influencers — a platform with over one million monthly readers — where I learned how audiences actually engage with travel content: what makes them click, share, save, and ultimately book.

I’m also a frequent contributing photographer for Travel + Leisure, and have worked with hotel and hospitality brands from California to France to Australia.

That background shapes how I approach every tourism campaign: not just as a photographer, but as someone who understands how these images will live in the world — on a visitors bureau’s homepage, in a sponsored post that has less than two seconds to earn someone’s attention, in a hotel’s Instagram grid six months from now.

For Lodi, that meant bringing a full creative directive to each location: custom prop kits, curated shot lists, detailed prep guides for every restaurant, and a storyboarding process tied directly to Visit Lodi’s marketing goals and target audience.

Nothing was left to chance. Every image had a job.

The Results: A Visual Library That Keeps Working

One of the most meaningful outcomes of this campaign is its longevity. Visit Lodi has returned to this image library repeatedly — for seasonal web updates, ongoing social content, advertising, and promotional materials.

Several images have been widely shared and have performed exceptionally well organically.

That’s the goal of a well-executed tourism photography campaign: you build an asset library that works for years. Not just a beautiful set of photos, but a strategic body of work that’s aligned to your audience, your brand, and the story you’re trying to tell.

For Tourism Boards & DMOs: What a Campaign Like This Looks Like

If your destination marketing organization — a regional tourism board, visitors bureau, chamber of commerce, or Destination Marketing Organization — is looking to refresh its visual identity and drive visitation with content that converts, here’s what a collaboration with me typically looks like:

Full creative direction — from brief development and moodboarding through shot list curation and on-set art direction, all tied to your specific marketing goals and target demographic.

Prop styling and food styling — I travel with an extensive kit of boards, linens, serveware, and styling tools so that every frame is intentional, not incidental.

Prep guides for every venue — so your restaurant and hospitality partners arrive to set knowing exactly how to prepare and what to expect, which means we move faster and capture more.

Multi-location, multi-day campaigns — built to tell the story of an entire destination, not just one piece of it.

Platform-optimized deliverables — vertical for Instagram and Stories, horizontal for website hero images, cropped variants for paid advertising and email headers.

Professional post-production — edited to your brand’s aesthetic and delivered on a clear timeline.

I’ve partnered with destinations across California and beyond, and I know that every place has a story worth telling beautifully. Whether your destination is already well known or still working to get on the map, the right imagery changes the conversation.

Ready to talk about what a campaign like this could look like for your destination?

Submit an inquiry through my Contact Form, here: chelsealoren.co. I’d love to hear about where you’re trying to take your visual brand.

---

Chelsea Loren is a commercial food and tourism photographer based in San Diego, California. She is a frequent contributing photographer for Travel + Leisure and has worked with hotel, restaurant, and hospitality brands across the United States, France, and Australia. Her work for Visit Lodi has been featured across the bureau’s web and social platforms and continues to be one of the most-used image libraries in their marketing.

All photography © Chelsea Loren Photography.