Marketing Missouri

by Jack Cashill

The goal of the (Missouri) Association (of Convention and Visitors Bureaus) was to help the legislators understand the need to stimulate Missouri’s tourism industry with (Department of Economic Development) funds. The great majority of these funds go directly into active marketing of the state’s tourism industry.

Missouri is expecting a record number of tourists this summer. “We’re seeing a lot of positive trends,” says Missouri Tourism Director John Robinson. “Our Web visits are up, requests for Vacation Planners are up and our promotions are generating a great deal of buzz.”

A survey by AAA, which suggests that people will hit the highways in record numbers, bodes well for a state that depends on highway travel. Encouraging trends at KCI also indicate an increase in visitors to the western half of the state at least. The preliminary numbers from Memorial Day weekend are positive as well, despite the high price of gasoline.

There is, however, one potential cloud hovering on the horizon, which has nothing to do with the weather. And that is the tight state budget, specifically the amount that Governor Matt Blunt will allot to the Missouri Division of Tourism.

Historically, the dollars slotted for tourism have been calculated based on a specific funding formula. Considered something of a national model, this formula went into effect in 1994. The formula anticipates the following year’s budget based on actual results from the previous year’s tax revenues as gauged in certain select SICs (Standard Industrial Codes), relevant to the tourist trade. Since 1994, the dollars budgeted for the Division of Tourism have nearly tripled from the $6 million budgeted in the first year of the formula.

The Department of Economic Develop-ment (DED), which oversees the Division of Tourism, has asked for $17.8 million for fiscal 2006. That is the same amount that was ap-proved for fiscal 2005. Both houses of the state legislature have signed off on the $17.8 million amount, but Blunt has yet to draft the final budget. He has until July 1 to do that, and in the interim, there is a good deal of anxiety in tourism circles.

The anxiety is not unjustified. Blunt’s initial proposal recommended a reduction in funding for the Missouri Division of Tourism by nearly 26 percent, a drop from $17.8 million to $13.2 million. DED Spokesman Pail Sloca acknowledged that the Governor faced a number of tough choices and refused to speculate on whether he would approve the higher figure. “It’s up to the Governor right now,” Sloca said. “The final decision is his.”

Marci Bennett, executive director of the Missouri Association of Convention & Visitor Bureaus, likewise admitted “the huge stress on state government to fund other things.” But she remains guardedly optimistic that Blunt will go along with the legislature. She knows how much he depends on it.

To enlighten Missouri’s legislators on just how much does depend on tourist dollars, Bennett’s office undertook an “intense education program.” The goal of the Association was to help the legislators understand the need to stimulate Missouri’s tourism industry with DED funds. The great majority of these funds go directly into active marketing of the state’s tourism industry, a program that Bennett described as “absolutely effective.”

Although not in the employ of the DED, Bennett has been greatly impressed by the sophistication of the work done by the Division of Tourism, both in its advertising campaigns and in the research that informs it. Unlike many state programs, the effect of the marketing efforts can be tested in the specific tax revenues that they help generate.

These tax revenues, in turn, help pay for the more sensitive social issues, like prisons and healthcare, the reductions in the latter having generated so much controversy already. “But we can’t [generate these revenues] without marketing dollars,” Bennett said. “It just cannot be done.” Bennett and others have made these arguments in their education campaign with the state legislatures. Given term limits, and the resulting turnover in legislators, the education process has had to be more comprehensive than in the past.

The fact that the new Lieutenant Governor, Peter Kinder, had been President of the Missouri Senate helped in the education of the legislators. He was not afraid to make phone calls on behalf of the Division of Tourism, and those calls had their intended effect. For the record, tourism is part of the hodgepodge of responsibilities in the Lieutenant Governor’s bailiwick.

In any case, Bennett is not letting the budget battles worry her. In addition to her statewide responsibilities, she also is executive director of the St. Joseph Convention & Visitors Bureau and is “absolutely optimistic” about the summer prospects in Western Missouri.

“I think the summer tourism season will be the best since pre-9/11,” Bennett says. And the budget will not affect that—not this summer anyhow.

Jack Cashill is Ingram’s Executive Editor and has affiliated with the magazine for 26 years. He can be reached at jackcashill@yahoo.com. The views expressed in this column are the writer’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of Ingram’s Magazine.