Poor weather and a sour economy have hurt tourism in Newport this summer, but the news isn’t all bad. Visits to attractions – the most popular of which are the Newport Mansions, run by the Preservation Society of Newport County – through June were up 4 percent.
The Newport Visitors Center – where the Newport County Convention & Visitors’ Bureau (NCCVB) sells tickets to 60 different attractions – annually sells about $1.5 million in tickets. “And, year to date, our ticket sales are up 2 percent,” NCCVB President & CEO Evan Smith said. “So what we’re seeing is that there may be more day visitors. If lodging goes down and attractions are going up … really the only plausible explanation is that you’re getting a higher amount of day visitors.”
“Tourism” is calculated from seven indices, Smith said. They are: lodging, attractions, shopping, dining, recreation, transportation and special events. “What happens, to be frank, is that in any given year some of those might be up and some might be down,” Smith said.
So while day trips may be up, lodging is down about 9 percent through the end of June, Smith said. “I think that it has to do with both the poor economy and the fact that we just had a terrible June,” Smith said.
Shopping also seems to be down, Smith said. But because of the diversity of stores and products, there are some that are doing well this year. “If you looked at the mean, I think sales are down slightly,” he added.
And preliminary figures for dining – only sales through May were available last week – show that Newport’s sales were down 11 percent. But meals were up 2 percent in Middletown. That increase could be credited to the price difference between Newport and Middletown restaurants. “I think what you’re seeing is that people are watching their travel budgets and a lot of people are looking to travel and dine at a moderate level,” Smith said.
Viking Tours, the Newport-based tour operator, is posting a small increase so far this year, Smith said, “which is nice.” The cruise industry, which last year brought a record 68,000 passengers on 38 ships through Newport, is expected to bring 40 ships this year. “They don’t originate here, so they’re weather-independent,” Smith said. “They’re looking at a record year.”
Overall, there’s been more regional travel to Newport – Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York account for 60 percent of Newport’s visitors – because of the economy, he added.
Travel from Canadians has dropped because of the exchange rate. Much of Newport’s international travel comes in the fall – to see the colored leaves, mostly – so it’s too early to tell whether that traffic will be down.
Special events in Newport – including weddings – haven’t much been affected by the weather.
“Weddings, thank goodness, [comprise] the market segment … carrying Newport through these challenging times,” Smith said. “We do more than 1,200 weddings here a year and the show still goes on. Economically speaking, you don’t cancel your wedding because we’re having a bad year.”
But Newport’s recreation industries – including beach traffic, which is down – are probably the most directly tied to the weather.
“Golf courses here, tennis, sailing options … clearly June was unyielding to them,” Smith said. “They’re all licking their wounds and they’re hoping they’ll gain in September and October what they lost in June. I don’t think the summer is too far gone where they can’t recover.”
Smith said that his assumption that the season can be saved isn’t just blind faith. He said his optimism is hinged on the big events still to come this year. That includes the long-running Newport jazz festival and Newport folk festival. And the fall will also bring one-time events, like yachting’s 6 Metre World Cup and 12 Metre World Championships, and semi-annual events, like the New York Yacht Club Regatta.
“Those three events are enormous and also in September there’s the international boat show,” Smith said. “So we remain optimistic after a difficult start because there’s a lot on the calendar for this fall.” •
