THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, June 6, 1996 TAG: 9606060002
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A14 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: 49 lines
In recent years, Virginia Beach tourism officials have become adept at marketing the city to prospective tourists up and down the East Coast and in Canada.
Colonial Williamsburg has been successfully selling itself for years. As have a number of American tourist destinations including Disney World, Hilton Head Island and, perhaps the most remarkable success story in the history of trying to lure people to places they would not think of going, Branson, Mo.
But national tourism experts worry that as a country, the United States has not marketed itself well. It's only going to get worse. In April, when the U.S. Travel and Tourism Administration was eliminated because of federal downsizing, we became the lone industrialized nation without an official tourism board whose business it is to lure foreign tourists to our shores.
Countries that aggressively engage in national tourism reap great economic benefits - France, Ireland, Canada, Australia and even South Africa come to mind.
There is a solution: In March, Sen. John Warner co-sponsored a bill which would create a 45-member national tourism board. The proposed board would be privately funded and would market a logo which it would license to selected tourist destinations and services.
The proposed U.S. Tourism Organization Act, or Senate bill S1623, is working its way through Congress. It has passed the House Commerce Committee and is now before the Senate Commerce Committee.
This bill would help boost tourism across the nation, including Virginia. Especially Virginia, if Senator Warner gets his way.
Even without effective promotion, tourism is big business in the United States. Staff writer Debbie Messina recently reported that last year, tourism generated $400 billion. About $80 billion of that was from foreign visitors. Unfortunately, those numbers represent a sharp drop from the previous year - tourism in the United States was off 19 percent last year.
In Virginia Beach, 2 million visitors came to dip their toes in the ocean in 1995, spending about $500 million in the process. Almost a quarter of those visitors were from foreign countries.
If Virginia Beach were included in a comprehensive American-tourism promotion, it could be an economic boon for the entire region. And Senator Warner has pledged to see that it happens. If the national board is created, Warner says he will work to get a representative from Virginia Beach on the board.
Those who doubt the power of good promotions need look no further west than Branson, Mo. by CNB