In 2019, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, tourism was a $300 million industry in Hattiesburg, with the Hub City widely recognized as the third-most visited city in Mississippi after hosting more than 2 million visitors that year.
After the dip in those numbers caused by the pandemic, officials are now looking at an economic rebound, which is partly the result of a “destination next” planning model. That model was discussed at a recent meeting of Hattiesburg City Council by Marlo Dorsey, the executive director of Visit Hattiesburg, who presented to council members the organization’s Fiscal Year 2020 report.
“That really helped us to identify what our strengths were in Hattiesburg, and also where our gaps were for growth,” Dorsey said. “It really engaged our stakeholders throughout the entire community on what they wanted to see to take Hattiesburg to the next level.
“Little did we know, all of that research and everything we were doing would really help put us on sure footing when March (2020) hit, and we had to just completely throw so many of those plans out the window. So this shows you how hard we worked to try to achieve national standards on things.”
As part of that process, officials did a deep dive into which individuals most visit Hattiesburg, which was recently recognized as home to the second-highest percentage of milliennials compared to other major cities in the Gulf South. By tracking data from visitors’ cellular phones, officials were able to determine the following:
- “Daytrippers” spend an average of $191.72 in Hattiesburg. Of daytrippers, 69.8 percent are female, while 63.8 percent of overnight visitors are female.
- Visitors to Hattiesburg travel with two people per party; often these are couples without children. Overnighters spend an average of $498.42 in the Hub City. The top three visitor activities are dining, shopping and visiting friends or relatives.
- Most visitors drive to Hattiesburg. Feeder markets are Birmingham, Montgomery, Mobile, Jackson, New Orleans, Dallas, Houston, coastal Mississippi and nonmetropolitan Mississippi.
- Of visitors to Hattiesburg, 40 percent of daytrippers and 47 percent of overnighters have a college degree.
- The results of a survey show that more than 70 percent of visitors said that local dining, festivals and other events were important attributes of a destination.
“That allowed us to market more accurately and authentically to a lot of those different markets,” Dorsey said. “We know exactly where those individuals are traveling from; we try really hard to … match what they like so that they can here.
“That’s something, as a result of the pandemic, that we’ve had to get a lot more sophisticated with, in how we approach marketing from a destination standpoint. We’re competing with people all over the country on how we do that, and how we’re safely receiving guests and following best practices.”
Because of the pandemic, Mississippi was down 19 percent year-over-year in its visitor economy as of the week of Dec. 12, 2020. However, the state still fared number one in the country for year-over-year visitor spending.
In comparison, Louisiana was down 39 percent, Florida was down 43 percent, Arkansas was down 34 percent, Tennessee was down 37 percent, North Carolina was down 40 percent and Georgia was down 34 percent for that same time period.
“That’s a strong testament to the amount of outdoor recreational activity, and our marketing that we were able to do,” Dorsey said.
Also playing a role in Hattiesburg’s economic recovery was the Hattiesburg Alliance for Public Art – a program of Visit Hattiesburg – which unveiled five new sculptures and one new mural in downtown Hattiesburg. Partly because of that, more than 300,000 people have visited Hattiesburg to see public art.
“As Mayor (Toby) Barker indicated, he would love for the city to be a city of 100 murals, I think we’re on to something there,” Dorsey said. “If we could create a welcoming, diverse, creative destination, where we can all reflect on public art, and make it accessible to people regardless of background and regardless of how much money you have in your pocket – if we can do that, we can really turn this into something.
“I think that’s just a tremendous testament to where we’re going.”
The Fiscal Year 2020 budget for Visit Hattiesburg includes $20,000 from the 2 percent hotel tax (84 percent), $30,000 for state Miss Hospitality staffing (4 percent), $85,749 for other income (10 percent), $6,000 for logo shop sales (1 percent) and $12,375 for interest earned (1 percent).
Expenses include $485,324 for sales/marketing/ambassador payroll (57 percent), $3,000 for capital expenses, $83,500 for total office operations (10 percent), $46,000 for destination business/leisure sales (5 percent), $61,500 for promotions/programs/grants (7 percent), $117,900 for digital marketing (14 percent), $47,500 for traditional/print advertising (6 percent), $4,000 for gift shop inventory and $5,400 rollover to reserves (1 percent).
