Great things are happening in Hot Springs, and it will take the community's support to keep progressing, according to Steve Arrison, CEO of Visit Hot Springs.
Arrison spoke to Oaklawn Rotary members on Monday about upcoming events and new businesses related to the city's tourism industry after a recent study by Longwoods International presented in early August.
"We try to do these research studies every 10 to 12 years and in 2013, Hot Springs saw 6.7 million visitors," Arrison said. "Of those visitors, 2.7 million were overnight stays and 4 million were day trips. Ninety-one percent came here on leisure, 8 percent on business and 1 percent came for a convention and extended their stay."
All of the numbers aside, Arrison said that Hot Springs' ultimate goal in tourism is to convert those day visitors to overnight stays.
"One of the things they (Longwoods) told us when they presented us with their findings was that we needed to hold more events to get people to stay longer," Arrison said. "But there's always something going on here. Being able to find a weekend that doesn't conflict with another event is the hard part, but it's a good problem to have.
"It's great not just for tourists, but for those people looking to relocate to Hot Springs."
The Hot Springs Jazz Society will kick off JazzFest 2014 this week as well as The Muses Opera Gala and a magical Weekend of Wonder, just a few of the "good things" Hot Springs has going for it.
"And then you look at things like Kimery Park, which hosted 42 teams in a tournament over Labor Day weekend," Arrison said. "They wouldn't have been here for the old Kimery Park. You look at the license plates and some are from Arkansas, but we've got a lot from out of state."
The success of the park, he said, should be enough incentive to continue moving forward with the proposed regional sports complex.
"I think the (advertising and promotion) commission started talking something like five years ago about the sports complex," he said. "We got all revved up on that, we had the site. The project's not dead yet, it's just not moving as quickly as we want it to."
Arrison said the sports complex "will happen" and that the commission is still working with Umetco and the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality to "hopefully get our option on the land and move forward."
"People want to come to Hot Springs, they want to bring their tournaments here," he said. "They don't want to go everywhere else because we've got everything they need right here -- water parks, we have hotel rooms, we have restaurants, we've got all sorts of attractions."
The project is "still on the board" and that the commission is still pursuing it.
Arrison said the upcoming election is also one of the most crucial the city is facing, and encouraged Rotary members to not only get out and vote, but promote their city in their various other organizations, adding that many of the events and conventions the city hosts come here because of "your connections and who you all know."
When asked about incoming conference championships, Arrison said the Great American Conference volleyball tournament is still on track for November; however, the bid for the GAC basketball tournament was not given to Hot Springs.
"We bid on the Great American Conference basketball tournament ... I really though we had that, but they decided to stay in Bartlesville, Okla.," he said. "We're looking but there's only so many tournament we're interested in.
"It's funny, we get credit for a lot of things, but a lot of what we bring in is because someone called out office and said 'Hey, what about this?' or 'I know somebody.' It always helps to have somebody on the inside. And that's very true for out convention business."
Being a part of alumni organizations and others, he said, are key to bringing these events to Hot Springs.
"All you've got to say is 'Hey, we want you to come to Hot Springs.' We'll go in and make the pitch for you, the presentations, get you room rates -- we'll do all the heavy lifting for you."
Local on 09/17/2014