Governor Terry McAuliffe announced that The Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival® received $25,000 from the Virginia Tourism Corporation Marketing Leverage Program grant fund. In total VTC awarded more than $772,000 for 62 tourism marketing projects across the state to help increase visitation and revenue for Virginia’s localities through tourism.
The grants are designed to help local and regional tourism entities attract more visitors by leveraging local marketing dollars, and will ultimately impact at least 260 other statewide tourism entities. The local organizations match the state grant funds by a minimum of 2:1 in order to support marketing projects. This funding cycle, the local partners will match the VTC grant dollars with more than $3.64 million, providing more than $4.4 million in new marketing to increase visitation to Virginia.
The Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival® received a $25,000 grant for the yearly festival celebrating the blooming of the apple blossoms. The Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival® partnered with The Winchester-Frederick County Convention and Visitors Bureau, The George Washington Hotel, Wyndam Brand and the Hilton Garden Inn to supply $25,000 in matching funds for the project,
According to Festival President, Mike Stanfield, “The VTC Grant is very important to us as it helps us reach out to a regional audience that each year brings over 250,000 festival attendees to the Winchester-Frederick County area.” This affects the area significantly economically and has a far reaching impact on tourism; we find that those who come from the surrounding region such as Northern Virginia often return to take in other local attractions and events.”
The VTC Marketing Leverage Program is designed to stimulate new tourism marketing through partnerships by leveraging limited marketing dollars, resulting in increased visitor spending. A minimum of three entities must partner financially to apply and may consist of Virginia towns, cities, counties, convention and visitors bureaus, chambers of commerce, other local or regional destination marketing organizations, private businesses, museums, attractions, cultural events, and other not-for-profit entities.
“Today, we take another critical step in supporting one of Virginia’s largest private sector industries and the individual communities across the Commonwealth that foster it,” said Governor McAuliffe. “These Marketing Leverage Program grants provide a vital opportunity for destinations and businesses across the Commonwealth, helping to create jobs, promote economic development, and increase visitor spending. I congratulate the more than 260 tourism partners across the Commonwealth that received funding for 62 projects – not only the highest number of partners awarded in the program’s history, but the highest dollar match by partners in a single funding cycle.”
Research shows that every VTC dollar invested in grants resulted in $16 of direct visitor spending. Marketing campaigns that received Marketing Leverage Grants increased visitation by 15%.
“The Marketing Leverage Program grants provide vital funding to our tourism businesses across the Commonwealth, helping to make Virginia an incredible place to visit, but also to live,” said Todd Haymore, Secretary of Commerce and Trade. “Through the MLP grant program, Virginia Tourism has helped demonstrate the power of partnerships, as well as the economic power of tourism. I thank all of our tourism partners and members of the General Assembly for their support of this program.”
Tourism is an instant revenue generator for Virginia. In 2015, tourism generated $23 billion in revenue, supported nearly 223,100 jobs and provided $1.6 billion in state and local taxes. Dollars invested in tourism are proven to provide a 7:1 return in tax revenue for Virginia, and the grant awards and matching funds provide a stimulus to localities seeking to increase tourism visitation and revenue.
