THE Nassau Cruise Port (NCP) is fine-tuning its efforts to bring more Bahamians back to Bay Street and revive the city’s nightlife.

The port’s marketing and communications manager, Shawn Gomez, believes some residents still remember when the security measures at the old festival place prevented them from enjoying the cruise port as tourists did.

Officials want Bahamians to understand that the cruise port is for them as much as it is for tourists.

“Nassau Cruise Port is completely different,” Ms Gomez said. “We want Bahamians to come down here. We have over 50 vendors within our marketplace selling a variety of goods, products, jewellery, even straight down to food and drinks.

“We want Bahamians to shop locally to keep the money within our economy and spread it around.”

The cruise port is one of the stakeholders and supporters of the Downtown Revitalization Project. Ms Gomez said a vital component of the revitalisation project is giving Bahamians an opportunity to “come back to Bay Street.”

“A few years ago, there were about five to six downtown establishments that had a nightlife, and you could go from one to the next to the other, and we often hear a lot of Bahamians talk about that time and reminisce about it being a very good time in nightlife,” she added.

“For us, while we’re not just centred around nightlife –– it is a family-centred place –– we moreso want people to come downtown and still feel that excitement and that vibe, and that’s what we’re trying to do.”

She highlighted numerous events at the port, which has featured international and local artists, holds a monthly Sip & Shop event, and hosts a popular happy hour every Friday from 3pm to 9pm. The port will introduce a new quarterly event, Soulful Sunday, this weekend from 7pm to 11pm, featuring the Essence Band and Nevandria Lyric. 

“We talked to local establishments that may be having their own happy hour, their own event at that time and we try to push the Bahamians that are already here at happy hour to go and attend those events,” Ms Gomez said.

“So we are basically crossing our audiences with each other, and that’s a system that we’re going to finetune and detail out soon enough.”

She spoke of the cruise port’s efforts to encourage its audience to frequent other businesses in the downtown area.

“We want them to go check out Souse Out. We want them to check out Sugar Rush. We want them to check out these different places downtown after they’ve enjoyed themselves at the cruise port because they still have the energy, they still wanna go, and they are our neighbours,” she said.

“Downtown is our community and we believe that 100 per cent.”