Tourism Talk blog

We continue to make progress on Destination 2028. Esports and event metrics Esports was a major opportunity under the Sports priority of the Destination Strategic Plan (DSP). I'm pleased to report that we have booked our first esports event, which will bring in more than 3,500 competitors and

Last month, my report included updates about Wake County Hospitality Tax Review stakeholders meetings. Two additional meetings have taken place since then. On Feb. 28, 2019: Raleigh Convention Center presented the need for improvements at Duke Energy Center for the Performing Arts and the

The story of Raleigh, N.C., at South by Southwest (SXSW) 2019 is one of collaboration. We talk about Raleigh being “a city that prides itself on our collaborative spirit,” which I suspect many cities say about themselves, but not so many do. You might have seen tweets and Instagram...

You have heard and seen us talking about the second annual Wake County Hospitality Job Fair, which happened last Tues., March 5, 2019. Over 55 employers were on hand to talk with several hundred applicants about job opportunities at their businesses. We are sharing some photos from the Fair below,

In case you missed it—GRCVB released its 2018 Year-End Tourism Industry Report last month. These numbers are of interest to all of us in the Wake County hospitality sector. ............. 2018 Year-End Tourism Industry Report Wake County hospitality industry has one of the best years on...

In our ongoing effort to keep our partners and other stakeholders “in the loop” about notable and recent developments which affect tourism, we are publishing monthly updates from president and CEO Dennis Edwards. Here are highlights from Denny for February: We are pleased to announce...

When I was 17, my mother was not content to let me lollygag about without a job, so she went down to the local Tastee Freez in my little town and convinced the owner, Alan B., to give me a part-time, after-school position. (I remember a few things about Alan B. to this day. He did his bookkeeping

In the first Tourism Talk post of 2019, we outlined the three talking points GRCVB will be reiterating in much of our communication this year. The first of those and perhaps the most important is the Value of Tourism. We explained in detail why tourism matters to Wake County in the second post of

In all likelihood, you have seen a story about Raleigh/Wake County floating around the last few days from The Washington Post, written by Melanie D.G. Kaplan. If you missed it, you can read it here. It’s a stellar piece and highlights many of the visitor attractions, museums, restaurants,...

Tourism has a way of feeling secondary to other forms of economic development in a community, maybe because it represents a transient group of people or because some equate tourism with vacations, free sightseeing and off-hours entertainment. It tends to not carry the import that it deserves. But