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Centre County Commissioners Support Second Tourism Grant Funded by American Rescue Plan

Boosted by federal and county support, tourism is back on the rise in Centre County after the detrimental impacts of the pandemic.

In July, the Centre County Board of Commissioners provided a $250,000 grant from American Rescue Plan funds to The Happy Valley Adventure Bureau that helped to boost visitation and hotel occupancy in Centre County in late summer.

On Tuesday, the commissioners approved a second $250,000 ARP grant for a 3.5-month winter campaign from HVAB to continue the drive to bring back tourists to the area.

Commissioner Michael Pipe said before the pandemic, Centre County was on track to “be a $1 billion tourism economy.”

“We know with the COVID pandemic, it will probably take a little time to get back to that. I think we recognize around the table that tourism and our tourism economy, when that is strong, we have a strong county. We can have good jobs. It attracts investment here. So, I think it is an exciting opportunity we have to invest another quarter million dollars into your advertising to retain jobs and benefit our local economy,” Pipe said after hearing the data from HVAB about the summer campaign, which was designed to further drive post-pandemic economic recovery through increased visitation.

HVAB President and CEO Fritz Smith told the commissioners the summer campaign helped to compete for the attention of tourists at a time when many Americans were ready to travel.

The funds were used to compete with other Pennsylvania counties — and other states — that were making significant investments in destination marketing and capitalizing on domestic and “stay-cation” travel trends, for which Happy Valley was, and is, perfectly positioned, Pipe said.

“Because of the pandemic’s detrimental impact on our own organization, this grant enabled the HVAB to effectively market the county at a critical time for our hospitality industry,” Smith said.

“We greatly appreciate the commissioners’ investment in tourism promotion and their recognition of the importance of sports, leisure and business visitation to the local economy.”

Smith said the campaign generated nearly $8 million in visitor spending during that 2-month period, “providing a 32 to 1 return on investment.”

Some of the other “encouraging results” include a 62% increase in hotel referrals via HappyValley.com over 2020 thanks to the campaign. This is above pre-pandemic 2019 and 2018 levels.

The campaign also generated 44.3 million total impressions to people with images of Happy Valley either in print, online or on broadcasts. This total was about 77% higher than the campaign target, thanks to high viewership during the summer Olympics in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia when many ads were displayed to the public.

A total of $315,556 was generated in the nearly 2,000 room night rentals via third-party bookings (Expedia and Adara).

“(In July) we did better on the weekends than we did in 2018 and 2019 from a hotel standpoint,” Smith said. He added that hotels were not as busy during the week.

“As we know, most people have their time off on the weekends,” Smith said. “But we view this as a big sign of success, that we outperformed 2018, 2019 on the weekend.”

In turn, hospitality jobs grew to 6,300, which is 97% of the pre-pandemic level.

“I think one of the most important things that this campaign was revolved around was restoring hospitality jobs. Almost 1,800 people got laid off … people who worked in restaurants, hotels and tourism attractions early on during the COVID pandemic,” Smith said. “The goal of this campaign was to try to get people back to work. And we believe it was quite successful in that regard.”

He said he thinks that the growth would be even higher, but many employers are having a difficult time finding workers.

The campaign also saw increased HVAB website traffic, including sessions, users, pages per session and page views.

Commissioner Mark Higgins said the efforts, “made people excited about coming to Centre County, which I think in fabulous.”

“The commissioners are excited to announce another investment of $250,000 into tourism and marketing efforts, through the HVAB, to support the thousands of employees and dozens of small businesses that make up our vibrant and cherished tourism community,” Pipe added.

The winter campaign will run through March 15, which is a historically slower time for visitation. Smith said the campaign will focus on couples, empty nesters and solo travelers and will be strategically directed at Pennsylvania audiences — western and central Pennsylvania in particular.

“This bridge campaign will help get us to spring, where activity across multiple fronts is expected to pick up dramatically,” Smith said, noting that both campaigns are elevating awareness about Happy Valley and building it into a four-season destination for leisure, sports and business travel.

“I think it goes without saying that these are jobs we have traditionally depended on as a community and when someone comes and stays in a hotel. They eat at restaurants. They go out and do other events. They spend time. They spend money and that is really the lifeblood that so many families depend on. We need to keep the fingers on the pulse of what keeps our economy strong,” Commissioner Steven Dershem said.

This story appears in the Nov. 18-24 edition of the Centre County Gazette.