Sarah Ebert, president of the Stoughton Chamber, told the Common Council that Visit Stoughton has hired Sarah Slager as the community’s new tourism coordinator and is seeing an uptick in visitors to downtown.

Ebert said the tourism coordinator is a 20-hour position focused on bringing organized tours and working with local businesses. “Her goal is to go out and meet and work with our businesses…to get tours into town,” Ebert said. She handed council members a new visitor guide and described recent website upgrades, including a calendar that lets organizers post tourism-related events.

Ebert said Visit Stoughton has begun using two location-intelligence platforms that collect anonymized, opt-in device-location data to understand where visitors originate and what downtown venues they visit. She said the data show the largest share of downtown visitors are local residents, followed recently by visitors from Oregon and a stronger-than-usual draw from Madison.

The presentation listed partnerships with the Stoughton Fair, Catfish Music, Taste of Stoughton and other local events, and credited local photographers and a drone operator for recent promotional materials. Ebert also previewed a July 15–19, 2026 Norwegian tour expected to bring about 250 visitors and said Visit Stoughton is tailoring outreach and programming to maximize the economic benefit for downtown businesses.

The presentation closed with Ebert inviting council members to direct event or tourism questions to her office; she said Visit Stoughton is funded by the city room tax and governed by an advisory commission.