City tweets to curb tourist drop-off - Phoenix Business Journal:

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Hotel consultant Drew Dimon expects hotels in Greater Nashville to see occupancy plummert 15 percent to 20 percent fromlast year’w levels. But the is battlingb the decline, in hopes of keepinh any occupancy drop-off below 5 percent. Bureauh staff is Twittering, Facebooking and sending out e-blastxs to announce free stuff to do, last-minute travel CMA Music Festival updates and attractions specials. “We certainl y don’t think it’s going to be some great summer,” says Butch president of the visitors bureau. “If we were flat to last I’d be ecstatic.
I expect that we will be down Spyridon hopes the valuee of Nashville will draw visitors because ofthe city’s wealtj of free, live, around-the-clock has brought back its free musiv poolside and is offering “kids eat inside the hotel for the first time this “At every touchpoint, we’rr creating events, promoting and marketing and adding extr a value with events,” Spyridon says, such as offering flight-hote packages when touted $49 flights to Nashville durintg a one-day sale in April.
The Nashvills Symphony has half-price ticketds for select shows, the Country Music Hall of Fame has been givintgout $5 off coupons through June 7, and Gaylord is offeringg four-night hotel and attractions packages at 40 percent off. Keith Wright, presiden t of the , says attractions are sweeteningb discounts this summer and focusing onthe drive-in market. “Regionalp tourism has become extremely importantrto us, and we are marketing more to that he says. Nashville’s biggest months for tourism are Juneand October, mainlyh because of the CMA Music Festivalk that pumps $25 million into the city everyg June.
Officials at the wouldc not say how ticket sales are going forthis summer’d festival, which kicks off next week. October is a popula convention month because of the fall Nashville tourism has been hit inrecent months. In April, the averager nightly hotel ratedropped 6.3 percent to $92.85 from $99.05 in the same montuh last year, according to Smith Travel Research in Hotel occupancy plunged 15 percen in April to 56.9 percent, down from 67 percentf a year ago. Revenue per available a key metricfor hoteliers, was down 20.5 percent in The amount of attendees for bookexd conventions this summer is down aboutt 24 percent from last year.
Nashville’s hospitality however, is outperforming much of the rest of the For the first quarterof Nashville’s average daily rate dropped 4.5 percent. Only five cities did and 19 of the top 25 markets did The decline in hotel tax collections is greater than the dropin occupancy, which shows tourists are comin g but choosing less expensive hotels, says Walt Baker, executive director of the . Nashville’ hotel occupancy dropped 11.6 percent in the firstf quarter compared to the year a drop that registered eighth best amongt thetop 25. Travel has continued to descend atthe , nearingb 2005 levels, says airportf spokeswoman Emily Richards. Passenger counts were down 9.
5 percenf in April as comparesd to theyear before, and down 9.3 percenr in the first four months of the