The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
“It’s really worthwhile to market those seats even at high season”
By Kendra Walker
Tourism and Prosperity Partnership (TAPP) executive director John Norton asked the Mt. Crested Butte Town Council to reconsider the rubric for their admissions tax grant and not prohibit TAPP from marketing airline seats in July next year. His hope is to secure funds from the admissions tax to help fill airline seats for both peak and non-peak summer months, rather than council’s preferred focus of non-peak windows.
Council stipulates that applicants request grant money for marketing events or programs scheduled outside of peak times, such as July. Council awarded TAPP $20,000 toward summer 2019 air marketing but had included the proviso that the funds could only be used to market June airfare- not July.
“I think we ought to use money during peak season,” said Norton. “Even in July there are a ton of seats to sell, and for the RTA [Regional Transportation Authority] it’s important that we sell those seats.”
Norton explained that even in peak months, the planes are not full and every unsold seat costs the RTA. This past July, planes were at 77 percent capacity and the RTA made $398,000 in minimum revenue guarantee (MRG) payments to the airlines. However, seats sold during peak months provide the most per-seat revenue, given his request that council doesn’t bar TAPP from marketing July airline seats next year if granted admissions tax money.
“You don’t fund events in July, but I think airlines should be an exception,” Norton said.
“Can you speak to the disparity between funding of summer vs. winter?” asked Roman Kolodziej.
“This year we absorbed the ICELab, which we thought was going to happen in September or October but it happened much sooner, in the spring,” said Norton. “STOR activities ramped up and a quarter of our budget is not going to tourism. Going through summer absorbing all these costs we thought we would be in a better shape as a community.”
Mayor Janet Farmer, who sits on the RTA board of directors, offered an additional explanation, saying, “In the past Crested Butte Mountain Resort gave $250,000 for marketing. Starting this year that was stopped and that’s part of why that’s gone to zero [in TAPP’s marketing budget]. Council recently granted TAPP $200,000 to support a winter air marketing campaign in Houston and Dallas.”
“I want to circle back to the fact that the TA was specifically formed to market to the airlines,” said Kolodziej.
“I think it would be really irresponsible of us to spend all our money only on marketing,” replied Norton, referring to TAPP’s new broader scope of focus.
TAPP marketing manager Daniel Kreykes is scheduled to present results from the 2019 summer grant at the next council meeting on December 17, and council will continue the discussion and seek more clarification from TAPP regarding their marketing budget at that time. Council will address Norton’s request at that time.
