Southern Sawyer County Tourism Marketing Project

Southern Sawyer County is home to the Tuscobia Trail and Flambeau River which are by in large popular ATV, UTV and Snowmobiling areas and typically in the shadow of the Hayward Lakes region. The Hayward Lakes region receives the vast majority of tourism dollars and host major events through the Chamber of Commerce and Hayward Lakes Visitor and Convention Bureau.

What is the Tourism Marketing Project?

The Southern Sawyer County Tourism Marketing Project is a collaboration between Hooties Hauler and Superior Marketing. Hooties Hauler will be implementing a series of Tavern Tours throughout Southern Sawyer County, the Tuscobia Trail region, and Flambeau River resorts area to help inspire additional visitor spending, create greater awareness for the establishments in these areas, and encourage them to come back to these areas on a family vacation, day trip, or overnight weekend vacation blitz.

In the following article, you'll see the data and analysis to support additional resources, focus and spending as a means to increase additional visitor spending in these areas. Our goal is to help bring more visitors to these areas and help them choose Southern Sawyer County as their premier vacation destination spot.

Come grow with us!

Mission and Vision

The Mission and Vision are pretty simple, and also pretty clear.

Help promote tourism to the area by using a simple three step process:

Create Awareness: Creating awareness by bringing visitors and vacationers to the area for lodging, food and beverage, retail, transportation and recreation, to name a few. Those categories are the top spending areas from the Wisconsin Department of Tourism report for Fiscal Year 2022. We want to create awareness that establishments exists in this area, and there is an abundance of opportunities beyond ATV, UTV and snowmobiling in this area.
Education: Educating prospective visitors that there are more than day-trips available in Southern Sawyer County, that you can experience family vacations in these areas with the plenthora of community festivals, events, recreational opportuniites, lodging and dining options, and that you can have a wide range of experiences in these areas.
Engagement: Hooties Hauler will be the primary driver behind bringing people to the area for these experiences utilizing the Tavern Tours. The Tavern Tours are going to be a great pre-cursor to driving traffic and creating short-term experiences. We'll leverage the Visitor Guide for 2023 and 2024 to help create additional awareness for the surrounding establishments.

Wisconsin Tourism Visitor and Spending Report from 2022

Visitor Spending

Visits to Wisconsin destinations increased by nearly nine million in 2022, bringing visitor levels to within 2% of pre-pandemic levels. Overnight visits led growth as city and event travel grew in 2022. With trips and prices both increasing, visitor spending jumped 16% in 2022. This growth has brought spending levels to 108% of 2019 levels. Lodging, including short-term rentals and second homes, accounts for the largest share of visitor spending in Wisconsin at 27%. Visitors spent 26% of their trip budget on food and beverages - in businsses from restaurants to grocery stores to cheese shops. Retails $2.9 billion in spending from visitors were 19.5% of the visitor dollar within transporation and recreation representing 13%-14% of total visitor spending in Wisconsin in 2022.

Visitor Spending by Segment

Visitor spending has increased, but the question becomes, "what are the visitors spending their dollars on?"

PURPOSE
89.2% - Leisure
10.8% - Business

DAY / OVERNIGHT
67.4% - Overnight Visitors
33.6% - Day Spending

VISITOR TYPE
97.9% - Domestic
02.1% - International

111.1M - People Visited Wisconsin in 2022
65.7M - Day Trips and Day Visits
45.4M - Overnight Visits

$14.9M in Total Visitor Spending in 2022
$4.9M - Day Trip Spending
$10.0M - Overnight Trip Spending

Market Attribution Report

The report is vast, but the key take aways from these reports come in the form of visitor attribution.

AVG LENGTH OF STAY
2.9 Days

TOTAL PARTY SIZE
4.3 People

ADULTS
3.0

AVERAGE TRIP VALUE
*$534

*This is calculated by taking the average daily spend of $184 and multiplying it by the average length of stay which equates to $534

Average Length of Stay

The national average for daily spending on vacation is $144 per day, this includes day trips and overnight trips averaged out. Wisconsin comes in at $184 per day which is calculated by taking the $534 average trip value and dividing by the 2.9 average length stay.

TOP WISCONSIN COUNTIES WITH AVG LENGTH OF STAY

Vilas County: 43.5 hours
Door County: 40.5 hours
Sawyer County: 37.8 hours

The goal will be to help migrate some of those visitors and vacationers from the Hayward Lakes area and inspire them to experience South Sawyer County.

How do I get involved?

If you wish to join the Hooties Hauler Tavern Tour, please visit HOOTIES HAULER TAVERN TOURS, and click the link to join the network.

Once you join, Hooties Hauler and Superior Marketing will be in contact about getting you set up with some of our options for tourism marketing, which will include the Southern Sawyer County Visitor and Vacation Guide, as well as cross-promotional opportunities to help bring more people into your establishment.

If you wish to chat further about the initative or get involved in the planning, we welcome anyone and everyone to be part of this project.

We look forward to working with you and helping you grow.

Curtis DeCora
Professional Certified Marketer
Superior Marketing

Joshua "Hootie" Hautamaki
Hooties Hauler