Georgia’s convention and tourism industry has fluctuated from reduced business and leisure travel in the past year. State lawmakers stand ready to allocate millions of dollars for recovery. File / Georgia Recorder (Savannah Riverwalk, May 2020)
In 2020, Macon officials did something unprecedented – they canceled the city’s annual cherry blossom festival for the first time in nearly 40 years.
Losing its biggest event was a huge loss for Macon, but Gary Wheat, President and CEO of Visit Macon, says he is “optimistic” that the festival can in some ways return this year. Organizers have outdoors Events planned daily in the second half of March.
“March is always a big month for us and we had a hard time last year when we had to cancel our cherry blossom festival,” he said. “It’s a very important part of our goal.”
Tourism experts are used to planning ahead, but as the COVID-19 pandemic continues, Georgian officials say the near future remains uncertain.
“We’re always looking for two in our industry [or] Three years on schedule, ”said Wheat. “To be honest, I can’t see the next month. It was a monthly process for us. ”
Even so, there is cautious optimism across the state that the warmer months are ahead, and ongoing efforts to encourage that Introduction of the COVID vaccine will bring back travelers and convention attendees to heal industries that have been depleted by the lack of travel during the pandemic.
When the pandemic hit Georgia publicly last March, Visit Macon had to lay off its part-time staff from both visitor centers. Wheat said, an increase in business helped everyone get back to work.
“We were lucky [that] From June onwards, we’ve seen a steady increase in visits, hotel stays and the like, ”he said. “We’re not on the 2019 numbers now, but we’re still seeing positive earnings.”
Wheat credits like Amerson River Park and Ocmulgee Park attract visitors eager to socialize safely outdoors. And while business travel has been suspended in Georgia and across the country, medical workers looking for a place to quarantine themselves from their families have stayed at local hotels, according to Wheat.
Truck drivers continue to travel miles along I-75 and I-16, which run through Macon on busy highways. The state-run DOT is also completing a massive construction project that employs a large workforce that needs places to eat and sleep.
“Obviously a lot of them are subcontractors coming to our hotel for a week,” Wheat said.
Across Georgia, hotel room sales fell 26.5% in 2020, painfully but not as bad as national sales, which fell 35.5%.
“We were better than [other] States and I would like to believe that this is a tribute to the leadership of Governor (Brian) Kemp and our ability to keep the state open, “said Mark Jaronski, Deputy Commissioner of Georgia.
In 2019, Georgia tourism was around $ 69 billion, but spending fell to around $ 12 billion last year. In addition to a loss of more than $ 642 million in state and local taxes, more than 53,000 leisure and hospitality jobs were eliminated. Jaronski says other measures have made him “cautiously optimistic” about travel this year.
“When we look at consumer research among travelers around the country and here, the desire to travel is greater than ever,” he said.
For the past six months, Explore Georgia has had its highest website traffic ever. People may even dream and plan to travel even in a time of pandemic uncertainty.
Of course, an influx of tourists also poses a number of challenges. Tybee Island Mayor Shirley Sessions called on the governor near Georgia’s beaches last spring to minimize the public health risks from COVID-19. The beaches remained open during the spring and summer months. More than 30,000 people visited Tybee Island on a peak day in July.
City officials have limited powers require people to wear masks in publicAccording to Sessions, there were signs on the beaches encouraging visitors to wear protective face coverings. Tybee Island and its two unincorporated cities have reported around 166 positive cases of COVID since the pandemic began. However, Sessions warns that these numbers may underestimate the actual spread of the virus by beach goers.
“There’s no way to get real numbers on a beach or in a community where people are here one day and gone the next,” she said.
While Kemp hasn’t closed the beaches as hoped, Sessions credits the governor with deploying Georgia State Patrol and Georgia Department of Natural Resources staff to aid public safety. Sessions said her staff honored employees in both departments with certificates and thanked the governor last fall.
With widespread COVID vaccination and herd immunity many months awayEfforts like this will likely have to be repeated this year if travel is expected to increase. In a recent study by the American Hotel and Lodging Association, 56% of Americans said they expected to travel for leisure in 2021.
In addition to the general lack of vacation travel, the hospitality industry in cities like Atlanta and Savannah has been affected by the lack of business travel over the past year. The accommodation association does not expect it to return to pre-pandemic levels by 2023 or 2024. Of the frequent business travelers who participated in the survey, 29% said they wanted to attend a conference in the first six months of this year and 36% expected to attend a conference in the second half of 2021. Still, 20% of the participants said that they will not travel for more than a year on business.
“In contrast to the leisure side, which is lagging, the meeting and congress side has almost come to a standstill,” said Jaronski. “We have to work really hard to get this back sooner than 2024. It will be a widespread effort. It will not only require marketing, but operations and public health and so on and so forth. “
Georgian lawmakers are providing millions in government spending to shore up the financial damage the COVID-19 pandemic has caused to the state-run hotel industry.
Last week, the Georgia Senators increased the state award for the Perry State Exhibition Center from $ 1.75 million to $ 3 million. They also added $ 3 million to support the Georgia World Congress Center in the Atlanta Convention Center. The extensive facility was converted into a makeshift medical center during the pandemic when hospitalization rates rose.
In January, Governor Kemp announced his Budget proposal for the rest of the year Includes $ 1 million for Georgia’s Department of Economic Development to promote tourism across the state. Jaronski said the additional funds would be used “to try to encourage visits to the many regions of this state and to help restore hospitality”.
Jaronski said Explore Georgia will make 50% available to tourism offices across the state, including the Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Tourism Association for the city of Savannah.
“Your funding is derived from hotel taxes, so after the last year we’ve been through many of your budgets have been hit hard,” he said.
While the deputy commissioner said he was working on details for the distribution of the money, they plan to come up with a suitable grant formula.
Despite the millions of dollars more government support, Jaronski emphasizes that Georgia still has to compete with neighboring states for tourists as people gradually feel more comfortable traveling again.
“Every state in the country, especially our southern states, follow the same travelers as we do,” Jaronski said. “It’s going to be a very competitive environment, but we do well because we have huge tourist assets across the state and there are a lot of really great things to do.”
