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09.11.2023 - 22:23 / skift.com / Dawit Habtemariam
The Sedona Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Bureau has formed a business improvement district with nine local hotels to fund its tourism promotion efforts, Skift has learned.
Earlier this year, the tourism bureau severed its partnership with the City of Sedona because its local government wouldn’t allow it to spend lodging tax funds on tourism promotion. The Sedona City Council put the breaks on it in 2021 because residents were frustrated with overtourism.
Under Sedona’s business improvement district, member hotels collect assessment fees from guests. The collected funds must be put toward programs and activities that support its members.
By spring, the tourism bureau expects it will have raised enough funds to develop an “ambitious” summer advertising campaign, the bureau said. The founding members will have to approve it, and they will receive special promotion visibility. The founding hotels combined consist of 800 rooms.
The collaboration agreement will run until 2026 and will focus on digital entrepreneurship, innovation, application of new technologies (big data, artificial intelligence, etc.) and talent development.
After a string of successful award wins throughout 2023, Weeva has won the global Responsible Tourism Award for ‘Addressing Climate Change’.
Only 8% of U.S. tourism boards strongly prioritize addressing climate change and reducing greenhouse gas emissions to zero. In contrast, 62% of European tourism boards and 29% of Canadian tourism boards have made it a top priority. That’s according to Sojern’s “State of Destination Marketing 2024.”
The U.S. and China will improve air connectivity and streamline visa processing, said Chinese President Xi Jinping in public remarks on Wednesday. Xi made the remarks at a dinner hosted by the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations and US-China Business Council.
Visit Orlando may see a cut to its $100 million budget – one of the largest destination marketing budgets in the United States.
Britain won’t see a full recovery in Chinese tourism next year – it won’t be until 2025 when Chinese tourists return to their pre-pandemic levels, VisitBritain CEO Patricia Yates told the UK Parliament’s Culture, Media and Sport Committee on Tuesday.
Tourists have stopped booking new trips to Turkey. The war in Gaza is deterring Turkey’s tourism bookings.
Tourists won’t be allowed to relax in Iceland’s iconic Blue Lagoon for the next few days. A volcano near the geothermal spa is very likely to erupt soon, according to the Icelandic Meteorological Office.
That’s according to latest research put out by the Global Wellness Institute, in its annual state of the global wellness sector, of which tourism is one part.
Sonoma County Tourism has announced the launch of its “Discover Your &” consumer marketing campaign, which is designed to inspire visitation to the destination in the off-peak season of November through April.
About two-thirds of European destinations remain below their pre-pandemic number of international tourist arrivals, according to the European Travel Commission’s quarterly report released Tuesday. The report covered the first nine months of 2023.