Pottery Company Out To Help Tourists

Sapulpa's Frankoma Pottery is celebrating its 75th anniversary this summer, as well as a new partnership with the state. The News On 6's Rick Wells reports with the help of the state tourism department, Frankoma will be helping its visitors find other interesting spots to visit.

Frankoma is the state's newest tourism information center, a new program to put information where the tourists are.

"They can pull in have coffee, they can enjoy the attraction of Frankoma, get more information," said Sandy Pantilk of the Tourism and Recreation Department.

The reality of higher gasoline prices has people who want to get away, to want to get not so far away.

"We are 12 minutes from Tulsa, of course two minutes from downtown Sapulpa and close to Oklahoma City. This is a nice little outing," said Crystal Merryman of Frankoma Pottery.

Most days, she says there are tours of the factory where you can see how they make the pieces you see in the gift shop.

"We're gonna do everything we can to make our guest feel comfortable," said Merryman.

So they're creating a little area for folks to sit, while others shop. There's coffee too from Java Dave's. There's something in it for the state, too.

"It extends our reach," said Pantlik.

It offers the tourist information to more people in more places. The tourism folks will train the volunteers on what information is there and the kinds of questions they are likely to be asked.

"We've kind of revamped this program, because we are all about public private partnerships and stretching the state dollar this is a great way to do it," said Pantlik.

Something else new coming to Frankoma later this summer, is really something old. An Oklahoma City Frankoma collector will display some of his collection at the gift shop. Some of those pieces date back to the very beginning of the company.