North Carolina tourism rates expected to drop as visitor numbers decline

NORTH CAROLINA (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — The summer tourism season is in full swing, but North Carolina leaders say they expect to soon drop out of the top five most-visited states.

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Officials with Visit North Carolina say the Outer Banks and the mountains after Hurricane Helene are both welcoming fewer visitors.

Visit NC says relief may not be coming so quickly: fewer Americans plan to travel this year, and international tourism is down, too.

“There are some economic headwinds and some discretionary spending challenges that still exist, but we’re seeing that prospective travelers are still prioritizing those trips, those weekend getaways,” said Laura White with the Charlotte Regional Visitors Authority.

White says Charlotte hotel occupancy numbers are up, but it’s not just hotels welcoming visitors.

Elizabeth and Stephen Hairgrove converted a former workshop on their Charlotte property into an Airbnb that they now say nets them north of $1,000 a month.

“I was actually really surprised at how fast people were booking up our weekends,” Elizabeth Hairgrove said. “We had people come from Oregon, that’s probably the farthest. And Florida.”

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The Hairgroves say being about 20 minutes from most of the attractions in Charlotte has helped quite a bit.

Even after what White describes as a slower winter for Charlotte tourism, the city still sees more annual visitors than Charleston and Asheville combined.

“People that are looking to escape for two to three days, come down for a sporting event or some major activity, and then build a well-rounded itinerary around that,” White said.

Like any good vacation, the Hairgroves feel that a touch of something unique is what keeps travelers coming.

“We have chickens, and we give [visitors] fresh eggs, a dozen fresh eggs when they come in,” Stephen Hairgrove said.

Visit North Carolina says it lost nearly 65 percent of its marketing budget last year when pandemic-era funding expired.

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Officials say the state now has the smallest marketing budget in the South.