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Visit Quad Cities outlines tourism data, targets and programs to Davenport council
Summary
Visit Quad Cities presented fiscal-year priorities, data-driven marketing efforts and visitor-experience programs to the Davenport City Council, citing $1.37 billion in regional visitor spending and a push to grow group business, improve hotel occupancy and expand accessible tourism efforts.
Dave Harrell, of Visit Quad Cities, told the Davenport City Council on an evening meeting that the regional destination marketing organization is focused on growing visitation and reinvesting nonresident revenue in local quality-of-life projects.
Harrell said Visit Quad Cities reports $1,370,000,000 in visitor spending for the region and supports roughly 9,346 jobs. He emphasized the organization’s data tools and partnerships, saying the group recorded about 13,900,000 visitor days and roughly 6,100,000 visits across the region in fiscal 2025.
The presentation described Visit Quad Cities as three nonprofit entities: Visit Quad Cities (a 501(c)(6)), SportsQC (a 501(c)(3)) and Quad Cities Destination Inc. Joan Kranovich, vice president of business growth and director of SportsQC, outlined how the organization recruits conventions, sports events and tours and calculates economic impact using the Destinations International event-impact calculator.
“We run those on every single piece of business that we are either looking at bringing in or we are bringing in, and then we do it again after the event comes in,” Kranovich said, describing event-impact reporting for the RiverCenter and other venues.
Visit Quad Cities previewed fiscal-year 2026 KPIs that include booking a minimum of 20 new group-business opportunities, a 10% year-over-year increase in qualified leads and a target to lift regional hotel occupancy toward 60% (the current snapshot reported 53%). The group also described ongoing marketing and analytics work using a geolocation platform (Datify) and lodging- and demand-data sources such as CoStar Group and STR.
Harrell highlighted accessible-tourism initiatives, including participation in the Sunflower program for hidden disabilities and a partnership with Wheel of the World. He said the organization has certified 305 tourism ambassadors through its Certified Tourism Ambassador program and that Union Station now serves as an official Iowa welcome center.
Council members asked for neighborhood- and asset-level data; Harrell said Visit Quad Cities can “polygon anything” in Datify to provide targeted analyses for specified areas of the city. The presentation also cited large upcoming events and partnerships — including the Central States Shrine convention and contracts with river-cruise operators — as drivers of hotel demand.
The council did not take formal action after the presentation. Harrell and staff left copies of the FY26 business plan and offered to provide additional data to city staff on request.
