Another tourism season is basically in the books. By most accounts it appears that the year was down around 6% or so in attendance. If you don’t count attendance and just count money you were most likely about even or up this year. Therein lays the rub. Many attractions, hotels, and restaurants have to raise their rates in order to keep up with lagging attendance numbers. What appear to be solid gains since 1999 in tourism tax revenue is mostly the result of operators increasing attraction tickets, hotel prices, and restaurant meals. The attendance is the same or down during those years for most.

There was an effort to compile attendance data from a sampling of attractions for the years 1999 through 2005. What the numbers show is a bit disheartening. Although sales have increased a large percentage through this decade, attendance is down. Yep. DOWN. There were fewer people visiting most of the participant’s attractions in 2005 then there were in 1999.

The data was collected from Custer State Park, Mt. Rushmore Parking, Mammoth Site, Bear Country USA, Reptile Gardens, Rushmore Cave, and Pioneer Auto Museum.

So it appears we have a problem. Is it the product we have or is it the way we promote it? Is it the competition or is it a core change in family interests? I don’t have the answer but I know we have a problem. It is way too easy to pat ourselves on the back and rejoice in every slight up turn only to have a bigger down turn the next year. We need to honestly look at our area and decide if we are being promoted effectively, if we are working together efficiently and whether we need to modify our product for today’s consumers. I look forward to taking an honest look at Black Hills tourism and hopefully figuring out this problem. I think we have a great product and a bunch of intelligent people who can figure this out.

Dinner Meeting Speaker – Mayor Jim Shaw – Tues – September 26th – 5pm – Alex Johnson Hotel

Get ready to mingle after a long summer of work. After the usual 2 month summer break in dinner meetings you should be longing to get together again with your old and new friends. We have a great dinner meeting planned this month. Mayor Jim Shaw and his wife Bev will be attending our dinner and the Mayor is going to participate in a question and answer period with our group. This is a great chance to listen to what is happening at city hall as well as ask a few of the burning questions that you may have.

Please RSVP right away with Ann (348-6907) or Sean (sean@bearcountryusa.com).

See you soon,
Sean Casey
Bear Country USA