Appomattox Quick Report A Short Report as of June 18, 2003 |
TOURISM & POLITICS: The big tourism controversy and disagreement between the town and county is about over. I have talked to a lot of people on both sides of the issue. The county decision to stop funding the chamber's tourism efforts will force the town officials to do more. My prediction: Since the county has backed the town into a corner, the town has no other option but to fund their own tourism program. They cannot afford to allow the visitor's center to close. It would result in way too much lost revenue to the downtown area. The county does not understand that the state will NOT certify two visitor's centers in the same locality, thus the the town is really in the driver's seat on this issue. Look for the town to contract with the chamber of commerce to continue to operate the visitor's center. What about a new tourism director? This issue is much more difficult to predict, but I think the town will fund a full time tourism director and ignore what the county is doing. Consequently we will have two people doing the same job. Very confusing, especially for Anne Dixon, but the county really is not funding a full time tourism director. They are simply adding to Ann's duties, thus the county effort will be part-time only. It is in the town's best interest to fund the position. In the meantime, I pledge to you that I will work with both the town and county as best I can. Who really benefits from tourism, the town or county? Consider this: If all 175,000 people that visit the park in one year stay one night and eat here, that will generate a minimum of (175,000/2 x 100/Day) or $8,750,000 worth of visitor spending annually. Of this amount, the town will receive 5% from the meals and lodgings tax. Thus, the town will receive $437,500.00 in taxes. How much will the county receive? They will get an immediate 1% return from sales taxes, or $87,500.00. However, according to the state, for every $1.00 spent by tourists, that amount is multiplied by a factor of SEVEN as tourism businesses and employees spend and re spend the money in the local economy. Thus, the county really receives $612,500 in sales taxes, or 40% more than the town. Either way, it certainly is worth hiring a full time tourism director to try and get our current visitors to stay overnight! Also, according to the state, the average visitor really spends $167.00 per day, thus the county benefits when tourists purchase things other than meals and lodgings. (Things like gifts, antiques, crafts, gasoline, books, magazines, t-shirts, etc) On top of all that, any good tourism director is going to work on increasing the number of tourists. So, WHO REALLY WINS? The people of Appomattox County! Remember that the people that live in the town of Appomattox are also residents of the county!! It has taken those of us involved in promoting tourism a long time to convince our elected officials that tourism is the best and shortest route to expanding the tax base and bringing down our tax rates. Thus, I am happy to see that something is finally going to be done about tourism. Now if we could only get the county and the town to work together!!! OF SPECIAL NOTE TO THE IDA, AREA BANKERS,
Let's talk about economic development. Especially about helping our existing businesses. Please remember that Appomattox County is competing with counties and localities all over the world for businesses. The economy will slowly improve over the next several years but businesses are constantly looking for ways to cut costs and maintain their profits. Just this morning I heard on a financial channel that call centers are looking to move to low cost areas. What would happen if Thomasville could make furniture a lot cheaper somewhere else? Or perhaps the tax rates in Campbell County became so much less than Appomattox that both Cardinal Chevrolet and Appomattox Ford were to move out? Tax policy changes behavior! What are we doing to protect the businesses we've got? We need to figure out how to help businesses cut costs and boost profits. Bankers, please consider cutting special deals for those that employ a lot of people. What about taxes? I think it is time to look at getting rid of those kinds of taxes that businesses hate the most. Taxes such as those on business machinery and tools, or on merchant's capital. Taxes are only fair when levied against bottom line profits. We need to do some creative thinking about how we can make our existing businesses more profitable! Ever try to get a job from a poor man? Your job future is much better working for a company that is profitable!! If we take care of the businesses we've got and improve our business climate, perhaps then we can attract new businesses to our very empty industrial park! WEB SITE UPDATE: The chamber of commerce has elected to sell appomattox.com to me, the web master. This will keep appomattox.com safe from political turmoil, and keep it from ever being sold to someone that will commercialize it. I intend to keep on plugging tourism and will work with the chamber, the county, and the town to promote tourism and keep the web site up to date and interesting. I have just completed a changeover in computer software that I use for the web site. I had to redo all 137 pages! I am now using Dreamweaver to create the site and make all the changes. This will make things easier for me and will make sure I can get the latest software upgrades. Dreamweaver also allows me to do more technical things. We are coming to the end of the summer vacation planning season. Be sure to see the web traffic graph that shows just how many people are using our web site. May was a record month. The new BUSINESS DIRECTORY is growing. A listing in the web directory will bring you more business! Please check your listing to make sure it is OK. (You must be a member of the Chamber of Commerce to be listed.) The new Historic Appomattox Foundation is almost a reality! Funds received by the foundation can be used for keeping the museum and the Cloverhill Village open, plus fund other tourism attractions. Click here for preliminary information. The Chamber of Commerce has a new fund raiser that will help support our big reenactment. If you are a hunter or shooter, you should love this one! They are going to raffle off a beautiful rifle. Please buy a raffle ticket and support our tourism efforts. PS: The person that sells the most raffle tickets will win a free night at the Babcock House, plus dinner for two! Click here for more information. If you are new to this report and want more in depth information, be sure to scroll to the bottom of the page and see all the available reports. |
Do you think your taxes
are too high? Remember that tourism dollars are magnified by a factor
of SEVEN in the local community! As tourist related businesses spend
in the local economy those tourist dollars trickle down to everyone.
This translates into lower taxes. |
Please scroll down for more information. |
POOR OL' RICH'S MARKETING TIPS
& TRICKS |
Web Site Quick Facts: 1. We have now had more than 143,000 visitors to our home page.
May of 2003 was a record! |
Thanks for working together and making Appomattox a great place to live! Rich Guild, WebMaster |
Click here to go back to the main index page of appomattox.com |
Planning your advertising? Check out these reports from the Virginia Tourism Corporation: Sources of information
used for travel planning and other interesting stuff
from the Virginia Tourism Corporation and also see how we rate in
the rankings of Virginia's
top tourism destinations. |
Need more in-depth information? Click on the reports below for more detail: |
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Marketing Tips & Tricks - An accumulation of tips from prior reports. |
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Graph of Monthly Visitor Traffic to the home page of Appomattox.com |
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Top Tourist Destinations in Virginia as reported by the Virginia Tourism Corporation |
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Travel Planning Information Sources as reported by the Virginia Tourism Corporation |
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