By MATT PIKE
St. Joseph Post
National travel and tourism week is coming and the St. Joseph Visitors Bureau hopes it will spread awareness about how important tourism is to St. Joe.
Visitors Bureau spokesperson Beth Conway says last year gave the visitors bureau an indication of what was happening in the tourism industry following the COVID pandemic.
"We did see a definite growth, but not a growth similar to those numbers we would have seen in 2018-2019, but we are very encouraged by those jumps especially our attendances at museums which were up 63%," Conway tells KFEQ/St. Joseph Post.
The 39th annual Travel and Tourism week runs May 1st through the 7th.
Conway says through the week the visitor's bureau will use social media to spread facts about tourism in Buchanan County.
"Hopefully kind of changing the minds of our locals that maybe think that perhaps we don't see a lot of visitors from various places but in reality, we see people from all over the world here on a yearly basis," Conway explains. "And so, we use it as a way to educate our locals on who comes to town and what their testimonials are."
Conway says one part of emphasizing travel in Buchanan County will be those testimonials from tourists, which she believes are very powerful.
"When telling stories about people and why they came here, what they came here expecting to see, maybe that their pre conceived notions were changed once they got here and they saw exactly how much there was to see and do," Conway points out. "I think those testimonials really speak very highly to the quality of an attraction destination we have here in St. Joseph."
The Visitors Bureau will also hold a big "Tourism Celebration" event on Friday May 6th in the parking lot of the Convention and Visitors Bureau.
Geranium plants will be given out, Q County will be on site for a live remote, and Geneo's pizza will be handing out slices of pizza while supplies last.