TAPP reports a consistent increase with visitor numbers

Winter still the fastest-growing season

By Katherine Nettles and Mark Reaman

Tourism is exploding into the spring and fall shoulder seasons, lodging revenue growth is outpacing that of similar mountain towns, air marketing is on and trails are still the main product marketed to visitors.

All this and more was the focus of a semi-annual Tourism and Prosperity Partnership (TAPP) update to Gunnison County and the town of Crested Butte officials last week, and according to TAPP’s executive director John Norton, “2020 may be our best year ever.”

Norton and his team of TAPP staff, including communications director Andrew Sandstrom and ICELab director David Assad, reviewed TAPP’s purposes and fulfillments of its Memorandum of Understanding with the Gunnison County Commissioners for both tourism and long-term economic development at the September 22 meeting.

Lodging revenues and tourism growth

“Lodging revenues are growing,” said Sandstrom. “And that is the end-all item on our overall report card,” he said. In fact, TAPP has tracked more than $20 million in lodging sales this year.

Norton said that shoulder seasons have grown 70 percent, “primarily as overflow from summer,” including both June and October.

Norton gave two reasons why 2020 might be considered TAPP’s best year yet, despite the pandemic: first, the Gunnison Valley has seen small lodging revenue losses (in the single digits) compared with similar areas.

“We’ve never seen the split from other hard-to-get-to players like Steamboat, Aspen and Telluride,” said Norton, all of which are down 20 percent or more this year due to the pandemic. “Those other resorts were off by double digits. Our July was actually the biggest lodging sales month in the history of the valley.”

July’s record lodging revenue was the second reason for 2020 to be a great year.

Norton said, “We saw an average of $2 million in visitor spending per week for those nine peak weeks of summer.”

Norton did acknowledge however, that the south end of the valley was struggling with its lodging numbers, as was Mt. Crested Butte. It seems Crested Butte is carrying the increases as a whole.

“The valley was down 2 percent in lodging revenues through July,” he explained.

“We planted the flag on trails,” Norton told the Crested Butte Town Council on September 21. “The commissioners wanted us to market the entire county and we are fortunate to have great trails at both end of the valley.”

As for the strong numbers reported this summer, Norton said, “Part of that is luck in that the trails strategy we adopted five years ago paid off when we were ready to open. My sense is that … 2020 could overall be bigger than 2019. We hope we can keep it up. We are very happy. It is great to see this type of bounce back. A lot of people have benefitted from it.”

Marketing

Marketing-wise, outsourcing photo and video production is a big part of the TAPP budget.

“We’ve been criticized that we spend too much on videos and content, but as they say, content is king,” said Sandstrom of the tourism industry.

Most messaging comes through digital technology, and TAPP is consolidating its four separate websites.

One of TAPP’s MOU directives of economic development is to recruit new locals by “Targeting professionals who now have the ability to work remotely.” The ICELab is marketing to those remote workers based on quality of life and access to trails.

“We have wonderful schools, wonderful towns and a wonderful trails system. People attracted to those are people who would enjoy and contribute to life in our valley the most,” stated Norton of the strategy.

The ICELab is also charged with supporting the Sustainable Tourism and Outdoor Recreation (STOR) committee, the Crested Butte Conservation Corps, STOR Corps and the Crested Butte Avalanche Center.

When asked by Crested Butte council member Mallika Magner about diversity in its messaging, Norton said TAPP has done some shifting to reach out and represent more people of color in its marketing. He explained TAPP’s partner, Blister, was producing podcasts with people like the founder of the National Brotherhood of Skiers and a current Black downhill mountain biker. He said more people of color are being used in photo shoots and an effort to attract the Black Foxes, a mountain bike club comprised of Black riders, was being made.

“Our focus is still attracting people in their late 20s to late 40s who are mountain athletes but we will be featuring and imaging more people of color,” Norton said. “We are more aware of that than we have been in the last few months.”

The TAPP representatives also responded to questions of two familiar, though conflicting, refrains from the community at times: that the Local Marketing District funds are being spent on things other than tourism, and that the marketing has been too successful and should stop altogether.

“Even if I weren’t with TAPP, I’d have a hard time arguing that tourism wasn’t important up until such time as we had built a whole new economy. As for our other efforts taking monies from tourism, they do. But for those who think we’re hurting tourism by working in other areas, it’s a difficult claim to make. 2020 may be our most successful tourism year ever, judged by how we are doing relative to others. And those five prior years have far outperformed old TA efforts,” responded Norton.

Commissioner Liz Smith said, “We’ve had trouble keeping up with people in the backcountry. I’m wondering, what do you see as the limit of growth when it comes to trails? Crested Butte has a really thriving arts scene, and there has been discussion of getting a more robust recognition of the Gunnison Arts scene to draw people here as well,” she suggested.

“The world changes in the north valley next year. And it does so with the designated [USFS] camping spots. There will not be the same wild undesignated camping that we have seen,” answered Norton.

Sandstrom said he also thinks the impacts will be mitigated by new campsite management systems, and thinks that marketing targets more thoughtful visitors.

“We want like-minded people here that will take care of the backcountry,” he said.

Regarding arts, Norton said, “We have found through Arrivalist data that there aren’t as many arts enthusiasts as we thought we would have.”

Sandstrom agreed that overall, “Arts are a great amenity once people are here, but it typically is not the reason they come.”

Smith said she understands that people don’t come here to go to the theater. “But there are some opportunities to get creative. I’m just throwing that out as a creative possibility to think through,” she said.

“TAPP’s function is not to create new products, but more to promote the products that we have. So as that develops, we will be able to incorporate it,” answered Sandstrom.

Commissioner Roland Mason asked about the organizational flow within TAPP, and how the organization would handle succession planning for the executive director’s position.

“I realize plenty of people have called for my head in recent months,” quipped Norton. “But thankfully, none of them are on this [commissioners] board.”

Given that TAPP operates on a budget of more than $2 million that is taxpayer funded, Smith said, an appendix of its specific administrative decisions would be illuminating. She said she has fielded a lot of questions on that during the past six to eight weeks.

“Our institutional knowledge is protected,” said Sandstrom. He and Assad cautioned that when the organizational strategy is clearly mapped out in detailed documents, then it can be also be used by competing entities.

“It may not help us in the long run,” said Assad. But they agreed to follow up with Smith and provide a walk-through.

Last, commissioner Jonathan Houck brought up a few high points, such as TAPP’s “connectivity to the PIO function” throughout the COVID response.

“I think it was the right thing to do,” said Houck.

He urged others not to lose track of how important that connectivity has been in achieving public health and economic strides, and will be important to maintain this winter.

Houck thanked them for their level of availability to the public regarding questions and, at times, objections.

Winter

“Winter is our fastest-growing season in the past five years,” said Norton. He noted that conversations with Crested Butte Mountain Resort executives have been optimistic this year, with EPIC pass sales up 14 percent from the same time last year.

“Vail’s intention is to open in November and stay open safely,” he said. “They don’t want an interruption like last year.”

TAPP does plan to have air marketing, in coordination with CBMR.

“In winter, Vail Resorts agreed with the same positioning we were taking where CBMR was seen as geared toward adventurous and extreme skiing,” said Norton. “That doesn’t mean families can’t come here and have a great time, but those families rip.”