Tourism financials continue to be on the rise in Eureka Springs.
According to reports heard by the City Advertising and Promotion Commission at its May 25 regular meeting, financial and marketing numbers both show noteworthy increases.
Scott Bardin, the CAPC finance director, reported to commissioners that tourism tax collections for April were $16,174 more than was budgeted.
“We’re doing well,” Bardin said. “We continue to do well on our fourth month of the year and our collections are continuing to increase.”
Specifically, Bardin reported that food and beverage tax collections were at $78,252 for April and the commission earned $77,922 for lodging collections in the month. Both categories were budgeted for $70,000 for April. The numbers look even more impressive
The numbers look even more impressive through the first quarter of 2022 where collections totaled $139,642 more than was budgeted.
?In addition, tax collections were $11,844 more than what was brought in for April 2021, Bardin said.
Commission chair Jeff Carter said he is curious how much of the increased collections are because of inflation. ??“Obviously, our numbers are up and Paradise [Marketing] is reporting that our numbers are up,” Carter said. “I’m just curious to how much of what we’re up is actually inflation.
“So, for example, how much have you had to raise your prices in the past year? I know how much I’ve raised my prices. So, I just want us to be cautious in the fact that we know inflation is legitimately real.”
Commissioner Patrick Burnett, who owns a lodging business in Eureka Springs, said he’s actually had to lower his rates recently because of slow business.
“We did [raise prices] a little bit, but I’ve actually had to roll them back because we’re just not seeing the bookings that we did last year,” Burnett said. “Now, I’m actually comparing this year’s numbers to 2019, and I’m actually finding a correlation there. So, I’m thinking last year we may have seen a COVID bump of people wanting to get out, trying to get out, spending more money, going to smaller destinations.
“I’m hoping that it will increase, but as of right now, each month, March, April, May, we’re down thousands.”
In another report, Molly Horton, the city’s marketing director and manager of The Auditorium’s operations, said the budget for the building is also exceeding expectations.
?“We only budgeted $18,000 for the entire year for net profit and [we are] already at $25,646 in the first quarter,” Horton said. “So that’s a big win over last year and I’m super excited about that.”
Horton mentioned that upcoming shows at The Aud, including Nitty Gritty Dirt Band (June 9), Three Dog Night (July 14) and Lost Dog Street Band (August 3) should help continue the upward trend in the building’s financials.
Madison Dawson, the city’s tourism director, gave commissioners an update from the most recent report from Paradise Marketing, the St. Petersburg, Fla.-based company that has a contract with the city.
Dawson reported than in April, numbers show that 75 percent of the city’s visitors stayed overnight, and 75 percent also came from out of state.
She also reported that the city had more than 114 million estimated digital impressions in April.
“That equates to over $1 million in estimated media value,” Dawson said. “Year to date, we have over 7.5 billion estimated impressions, and that equates to over $69 million in estimated media value year to date.??Dawson said there was an 11 percent increase of website visitors from Missouri in April.
“And that surpasses Arkansas as the top market for website traffic,” she said. “So, that means that people in Missouri are looking at our website more than anybody else right now, which is interesting.
“We also had 73.7 percent of [website] users in April who were new users, which is great.”
Dawson also told the commission that she will be attending the Destinations International Conference in Toronto in July.
In other business, the commission unanimously approved an agreement with Rogers attorney Bill Watkins to provide any legal advice needed for day-to-day business.
“It is typically industry standard for a [destination marketing organization] to have an attorney on retainer,” Dawson said. “So [Bardin] has been wonderful at finding us a great attorney with some great background in A&P, specifically Arkansas A&P Commissions.
“It’s going to be great that we will have someone that we can just call up or email and say ‘hey, can you give us your opinion on this?’ Or ‘how is another A&P handling this in your expertise?’ ”
While no specifics of the approved agreement were discussed, including what an hourly rate would cost the CAPC, Carter mentioned that an expense like this is already in the CAPC budget.
“We have a $7,000 budget,” Carter said. “We can’t go outside of that.”
Carter also pointed out that any legal advice the CAPC would get from the attorney would be specifically for things such as audit processes and tax remittance questions.
“That kind of stuff,” Carter said. “Just let me say, this has nothing to do with any lawsuits.”
The commission closed the meeting by approving three separate $5,000 marketing funding requests for advertising upcoming events.
?Laci Moffit with Jeep Jam, commissioner Carol Wright with Opera in the Ozarks and Trish Collins with the Eureka Springs Jeep Fest all had financial requests approved unanimously.
