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TourismOhio Chief Speaks to Appalachian County Group
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio -- Tourism activity in Mahoning and Trumbull counties accounted for a quarter of the $4.1 billion in tourism revenue generated in Ohio’s 32 Appalachian counties last year, the state’s director of tourism told convention bureau directors.
Mary Cusick, speaking Wednesday before a meeting of Ohio’s Appalachian County group at the Butler Institute of American Art, said Mahoning County generated 15% of the dollars spent on tourism-related activities in the 32-county region. Clermont County accounted for 11%, followed by Trumbull County with 10%.
“Mahoning County helps drive tourism when it comes to Appalachia, and it has to do with the economy in terms of the size, the penetration of the population and tourism product,” Cusick said.
The “incredible activity” throughout Appalachian Ohio as well as in Mahoning County ranges from various sporting events, “wonderful restaurants” and retail, she elaborated.
“It just shows that tourism is an economic driver in just about every community,” commented Linda Macala, executive director of the Mahoning County Convention & Visitors Bureau. “People don’t often think that way because they may get hung up on the word tourism --and they think Disney World or Vegas -- but there’s so much more to the term. … When people see the numbers, it’s a real eye opener.”
Throughout Ohio’s Appalachian counties, 52,000 jobs were attributed to the tourism industry in 2013, accounting for $1 billion in personal income and payroll, numbers Cusick characterized as “impressing” and “meaningful.”
Statewide, tourism generated $38 billion in economic impact and accounted for 405,000 jobs in 2013, she added.
In Franklin County, a large metropolitan area driven by activity in Columbus, the impact is $8.2 billion, and in Cuyahoga County the impact is $7.4 billion.
No place better represents the experience that today’s travelers and families are looking for than Ohio’s Appalachian counties, which have a “very distinctive offering” from its large cities, metro areas and farms to Amish country, Cusick said.
“The authenticity of an offering and a product and a region really drives an experience,” she observed.
TourismOhio is crafting a strategic plan that will provide “a guideline in terms of the best structure” for the agency to support the tourism industry and market Ohio as a destination, she said.
“The plan will tell us the things we need to accomplish,” she said. “One of the things we know we need to do is enhance and position our brand Ohio better.”
The convention bureau guests also heard about a marketing initiative taking place throughout the multistate Appalachian region.
“Bon Appetit Appalachia” is a campaign that markets food-related tourism, from festivals and farm markets to wineries, farm tours and craft brewers from southern New York to Mississippi, said Paige Alost, executive director of the Athens County Convention and Visitors Bureau and Ohio’s representative to the ARC tourism council.
“For us in the Appalachian region, we see it as a way to promote something we’re well known for -- the wineries and the farm-to-table experience, food festivals, farmers markets -- all the things that people expect to see when they come into rural Ohio.
Copyright 2014 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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