Despite the weather, tourism prevails

New Mexico Business Journal, Nov, 2000 by Catherine Coggan

Luring visitors depends on the weather and the money available to promote it as well as a few clever ideas.

When tourism in New Mexico is having a bad H.A.R.E. year, Paul Narbutas, research manager and economist for the state's Department of Tourism, is the first to know. Narbutas formulated the H.A.R.E. Index (Hotel, Amusement, Recreation and Eating) as a quick comb through the stars for a succinct glance at what's going on.

So far, the latest figures show that "the year is good," Narbutas declares. Despite the warm winter, the fires and the high gas prices, income from tourism showed an increase. "The first nine months of the year (December 1, 1999 - August 31, 2000) is up 7.5 percent," Narbutas says. And, there is support for this rise. At least in some parts of the state.

In Raton, Mark Roper, the executive director of the Raton Chamber and Economic Development Council, reports a championship season. "We had a great year; a record year." Although the rise in gasoline prices had Roper worried, there was a 12 percent increase in lodgers' tax revenue and a 12 percent gain in visits to the Raton Visitors' Center. New Mexico's manager for the nine state-run visitor information centers, Gary Romero, isn't surprised by Roper's findings.

"The state has been very busy this year. At the end of September, we were 100,000 visitors shy of 1999 totals," says Romero. His office registered 633,979 visitors to the centers. Comforting though the numbers are, Romero cautions that "Tourism in the state has stayed flat for the last five years." The reasons are a bit labyrinthine.

Ed Jungbluth, executive director of the Gallup Convention and Visitors Bureau, has an opinion or two. As a state director of tourism from 1934 to 1987, Jungbluth has seen it all. Or almost. "Something I learned after 23 years in state tourism," he says, "is if the state has poor snow, we suffer, too." New Mexicans tend to think all our business comes from summer visitors. The truth is that winter recreation brings in a lot of tourist dollars, too.

For the last five years the poor snowfall has frozen the ski resorts' best prognostications. According to a report from Ski New Mexico, the industry's local trade association, winter 1999-2000 was one of the worst in 20 years with a mere 645,550 skier days (a skier day is one skier skiing any part of a day). In comparison, the 97-98 year saw 1,257,786 skier days.

Despite herculean snow-making efforts last year, most resorts suffered cruelly. Red River's skier days increased by 5,000 but Taos Ski Valley's were off by 110,000. During the past summer, the ski areas began beefing up their snow-making facilities with computer-regulated, state-of-the-art equipment that can make snow at lower temperatures with less water and can go higher up the mountain to provide good snow for the expert runs.

Nonetheless, Tom McCampbell, president of Ski New Mexico, is holding his breath. "Our fortunes are really tied to the snow," McCampbell says. Making snow is about all anyone can do to respond to the crisis. "It's a gallant effort to do this. The end product is excellent snow. But it's still a challenge convincing our visitors. They want a winter wonderland look, which is hard to provide."

Although tourism is by nature seasonal, Janet Green, the state secretary of tourism, observes that "we can't control the weather but we can control how we react to the impact it has." Green's department moved quickly when the warm weather threatened catastrophe for the stake's ski resorts. It directed the focus of the advertising campaigns. "Red River," she says, "had good snow, so we tried to send our visitors there."

Snow is easy to pinpoint as a culprit, but it's not the only problem. A negative media slant about natural disasters in the state can rip through the economy like a dose of salts.

Jungbluth is frank in his opinon of New Mexico's television stations. Their treatment of the hantavirus scare of a few years back and this year's forest fires still rankles. "I can't harp on this strongly enough," he says. "With banners like 'New Mexico on Fire!' they change people's perceptions. They over-blow issues. They have these flashpoints they think are so great. But it hurts the state. The hantavirus scare is another example."

Actually, Simon Brackley, vice president for public affairs for the Santa Fe County Chamber of Commerce, touched on this issue as well. "Wrongly identified on CNN as the Santa Fe fire, people were ringing our phones off the hook. We had to assure people." Even the water shortage didn't cut into tourism the way television coverage of the fires did.

Paul Narbutas has a different take. "People came but rearranged where they wanted to be. Taos, for example, had no fires but all the forests were closed as a precaution so people went to another part of the state."

Well aware of the damaging effect the media fire coverage could have for the state, Green and her staff collected a list of all the people who requested a visitor's guide 90 days before the fire. They then sent these potential visitors a postcard. "It showed a beautiful scene of New Mexico," Green says. "On the reverse we said, 'the only thing missing is you.'" If the 7.5 percent increase is anything to go by, the idea worked.