Tourism Talk blog

The 2019 GRCVB Annual Meeting, “Why Tourism Matters,” is in the books. Here are some scenes from our favorite day of the year. The theme What we hoped our guests would take away from this event was summarized in the theme—Why Tourism Matters—specifically how visitors and...

GRCVB released 2018 tourism numbers last week with some impressive results. Wake County welcomed 16.8 million visitors in 2018, an increase of 4.8% over 2017. These visitors who traveled to Wake County spent $2.7 billion, an increase of 7.2% over 2017. Both the numbers of visitors and visitor

The Wake County Destination Strategic Plan (DSP) is garnering international attention. The Destinations International Annual Convention is happening this week in St. Louis, where over 1,400 representatives from convention and visitors bureaus from around the world will be attending. I have been

Hospitality tax stakeholders City and County leaders hosted a hospitality tax stakeholders meeting at Marbles Kids Museum on June 19. I would like to congratulate the County Manager and Raleigh City Manager and their staffs on developing the proposal and for the transparency of the process. I

We are joining with the U.S. Travel Association this week to celebrate National Travel and Tourism Week (NTTW). You have heard us say this before, but Tourism Matters. And here's why... Why travel matters in Raleigh, N.C. We pass popular tourist sites like Marbles Kids Museum every day; we may...

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 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

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

As we move further into the implementation phase of the Destination Strategic Plan, we are making every effort to keep our partners and stakeholders informed about the work of GRCVB as Destination 2028 starts to take shape. To that end, here is president and CEO Dennis Edwards’s report to the...

Imagine if Hallmark offered in tourism section in their stores. Those cards might read something like this— Now that the Thanksgiving holiday is upon us, it is once again time to give thanks for the many blessings and benefits that are ours. For those of us who live in Wake County and work in...