Wisconsin Department of Tourism
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The Bureau manages and supports the fulfillment of telephone and Internet requests for travelinformation, while ensuring that Department-produced publications are also available at WisconsinWelcome Centers, travel and sport shows, and other remote locations.The Communications and Industry Services Bureau is responsible for promoting Wisconsin tourismthrough public relations and “earned” or no cost exposure in various media. The Bureau issuesregular news releases on travel topics and offers weekly event reports to radio and T.V. It preparesseasonal media “kits” and offers familiarization tours to travel writers. The Bureau also employstwo Economic Development Specialists outside of Madison who advise businesses and communi-ties around the state on strategies for local tourism development success.
Research and Overview of Market
Wisconsin is a four-season destination with summer as the top tourism season, followed by fall,spring and winter.Leisure travel represents more than 70 percent of traveler expenditures ($8.64 billion in 2005). Thisbroad category includes those enjoying outdoor recreation, sporting events, casino gaming, grouptours, attending festivals or attractions, visiting friends or family, dining, shopping and cultural aswell as other urban activities.The Wisconsin travel and tourism industry continues to grow, showing over a one hundred percentincrease in traveler spending from 1994. Traveler spending during 2005 topped $11.9 billion. Themajority of Wisconsin leisure travelers are our own residents (58 percent) with an additional twen-ty-one percent coming from Illinois. Other states contribute to the rest of our travelers with threepercent coming from other countries. Of those visitors from other states, Minnesota produces sixpercent of the market and Michigan provides an additional four percent.Our research shows that Wisconsin’s leisure travelers are divided seasonally and among families,couples and groups of friends. Although there are similarities between seasons, families tend tomake up the largest segment of travelers during the summer; couples dominate during spring andfall; and groups of friends during the winter.Females request Wisconsin travel information more frequently than males. Forty percent of theChicago and Twin Cities visitors are between the ages of 35 and 54. An additional 15-17 percentare in the 25 to 34 year age bracket and 16 percent are in the 55 to 64 year age bracket. Themajority, 75 percent, has attended or graduated from college or technical college and a majority ofhouseholds have incomes over $40K. When looking solely at registered visitors totravelwisconsin.com, those customer demographics skew older (70 percent are over the age of45), but still support the notion that females are the primary information gatherers. Nearly 60 per-cent of registered users are females.
Leisure Promotion
We are into our second year with the theme “Wisconsin, Life’s So Good”. This year we’re poisedto build on the current efforts to gain recognition for the theme with enhancements scheduled tolaunch with the summer ’07 campaign. These enhancements will reinforce the emotion and con-nection visitors have with a Wisconsin experience. Additional strategic objectives include high-levelpay-off on authentic Wisconsin cuisine, local foods and the agri-tourism experience coupled withan emphasis on the state as an eco-tourism destination.
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