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Tourism director: Ice Festival, new campaign and data tools aim to boost Haywood County visitor spending
Summary
Haywood County tourism director Corina Rufier told county commissioners the Visit Haywood office used festival data and a new Event Impact Calculator to quantify visitor spending, launched a targeted summer marketing campaign and awarded grants for events and marketing.
Corina Rufier, Haywood County tourism director, reported to the Board of Commissioners on Aug. 4 that data from the 2025 Ice Festival and other projects are guiding marketing and grant decisions aimed at increasing visitor spending and supporting local businesses.
Rufier said the Visit Haywood office used ticket sales and post-event surveys as inputs to an Event Impact Calculator developed by Tourism Economics and Destinations International to estimate visitor-driven economic impact. The tool estimated 1,664 attendees who were nonlocals, 433 room-nights, about $434,000 in direct visitor spending and $566,000 in total economic impact from a four-day Ice Festival weekend, and it supported an estimated 110 to 138 jobs.
The data-driven approach…
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