Visitors Bureau helps the area
I'd like to clarify the recent article regarding the visitors' bureau being tested and our continued discussions with Palatine.
Every year (for 25 years) we must re-certify with the State of Illinois and we are one of only 50 convention bureaus worldwide that have earned an International Accreditation. We invite accountability.
Within the Northwest corridor of Chicagoland, we have vibrant communities that form an exciting and competitive region for tourism marketing that have a lot to gain by both leisure and business travel promotion. The concept of destination marketing has been around for more than 90 years and there are at least 625 visitors bureaus from more than 25 countries -- 40 in Illinois alone. We respect and value every community and dollar that our partners invest in this cooperative effort.
In previous discussions with Palatine, the local hotel (visitor) tax was raised to 5 percent (for a total of 11 percent). Hotels were in favor of this increase to continue the sales and marketing collaboration with the bureau. Last year, in our group sales alone for Palatine, the returned room revenue was $3.45 for every one of the visitor tax dollars invested.
If you include total travel spending in our market, the ROI is potentially $15.70 economic return for every dollar invested.
This isn't even considering the leisure and transient business that is influenced by the millions of media and web impressions we generate. The visitors pay this tax; the more visitors, the more tax dollars and spending comes into your community.
Our office writes and secures over $800,000 in State of Illinois grants annually to bring tax dollars back into this region for the purpose of tourism marketing. Everyone benefits -- granted, it can be a confusing funding model, but it works and the local residents do not subsidize it.
I look forward to continued discussions and review of our community partnerships and ask only for fairness in the forum of the review process. Our visitor inquiries are up 37 percent, sales leads up considerably and we want the communities to share in this success.
Fran Bolson, president
Woodfield Chicago Northwest Convention Bureau