Photo by John Larson
TOURIST INVASION. Visitors from elsewhere in the Northwest and other sections of the country hit Tacoma for Tall Ships. Pierce County is analyzing the economic impact of the five-day festival.
Now that the tall ships have sailed out of Tacoma, businesses and organizations are working to judge the economic impact of the festival on the local economy.
Business and tourist organizations in the area could only relate anecdotal information at this point, but Tammy Blount, executive director of the Tacoma Regional Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB), said her organization saw an increase in phone and e-mail inquiries, as well as a huge bump in inquiries at the visitors’ information center. The CVB extended the hours of the center during the festival to accommodate all of the inquiries.
Bob Casey, general manager of The Harmon, said his restaurant saw about a 20 percent increase in customers over the weekend.
“Last time it happened, we really got run over, so we made sure we were ready this time,” he said. “I think Tall Ships brought a lot of (extra) people into our restaurant...It was great for us.”
The Silver Cloud Inn on Ruston Way was packed full over the weekend, but Shellie Banuelos, director of sales, could not directly attribute that to Tall Ships.
“We fill up every Fourth of July so it’s hard for us to know if they were coming specifically for Tall Ships,” she said. The hotel is already booked full for next year’s Fourth of July weekend.
However, she added, “we did have quite a few people that had reservations made that wanted to check in early on the third so they could check out Tall Ships.”
Not all stories of the impact of the event were positive. Patrick Coyne, owner of Paddy Coyne’s Irish Pub on Pacific Avenue, said he did not see a significant increase in business.
“It was like a regular weekend for us,” he said.
Coyne also had a booth at the event, where he sold fish and chips and drinks. He had hoped for 3,000 visitors to the booth, but served only 650 people. He attributed the low number to “too many vendors and not enough people” at the event. Still, he said next time Tall Ships comes around, he will consider having a booth again – he will just do more research.
Over the next several weeks, different organizations and agencies will be considering the effect of the festival in the area more in-depth.
The Pierce County Economic Development Division hired a consulting firm to put together an in-depth analysis of the impact of the event on the Tacoma and Pierce County economies. At the festival, several volunteers collected surveys from attendees, asking who they were, where they were from and how they planned on spending their money.
“We’re trying to get a sense of what this event means to the local economy,” said economic development specialist Sam Wagner. “If we can attach some numbers to that, if we can see not only what people are spending (at the festival) but what maybe that second tier spending is as well, the downstream effect on the economy of an event in this size…as well as demographic information…that’s of interest for us and for planning future events as well and finding potential sponsors down the line.”
The county collected about 550 surveys. The analysis will be completed in August or September, Wagner said.
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