Our Tourist Industry Isn’t for the Tourists

by Bret Bicoy President and CEO, Door County Community Foundation

It’s early February as I write this, and there is little snow on the ground, the temperatures are regularly above freezing, and I nd myself checking the Sister Bay Marina camera to see whether the Goat on a Boat has nally begun to oat, indicating that the ice has melted away. In other words, all the signs are pointing to the reality that Door County’s “season” will soon be upon us.

This time of year always lls me with mixed emotions. I’m happily looking forward to the return of our many seasonal friends. I’m enthusiastic that my lovely wife and I will soon be able to take our evening walks through downtown Sturgeon Bay. I’m extremely excited that the golf courses will soon be open. Yet if I’m being perfectly honest, I will admit that I’m not necessarily looking forward to sharing space with the throngs of visitors who will soon be crowding our community.

I intellectually understand the tremendous impact that visitors have on our economy. What surprised me was to learn that economists consider tourism to be an export.

When I bought my van from a local car dealer, that transaction moved money between people who already live in Door County. The same holds true when I go out to dinner, shop at a grocery store or spend an evening at the theater down the street: It’s one local person giving money to another local person, business or organization. Through these transactions, I have a little less and the other guy has a little more, but the total wealth of Door County hasn’t changed. We’re essentially just recirculating our dollars around the community. For an economy to grow, new money must be brought into the system. That’s where exports come in.

When we think of exports, we imagine a community that manufactures widgets exporting them to people who live outside that community. Exporting widgets has an oversized economic impact because it brings new money into a region from people who live outside that region.

Consequently, exports are a primary way for a community as a whole to grow wealthier. Recirculating money among people who live in the same place is just slicing up the pie so that if I take a bigger piece, yours must be a bit smaller. Exports grow the pie so that all of us get to enjoy a bigger bite.

Economically, that’s essentially what happens with tourism. People from outside Door County bring their money to our community and leave it behind for us to enjoy. Rather than just recirculating the existing wealth in our county, tourism is an export because it has the same e ect as selling widgets to outsiders: It grows the economic pie so we can all have more to eat. Visitors spent $423 million in Door County in 2021. That’s money coming in to create jobs, provide economic opportunities and build wealth in Door County.

We want our visitors to have a wonderful time in Door County because we’re a welcoming community and we love to share the place we call home. Yet the truth is that the tourist industry in Door County isn’t actually for the tourists. The primary bene ciaries of tourism are the residents of Door County.

In many ways, this philosophy has never been more apparent than under the new and rejuvenated leadership teams of Destination Door County and the Door County Tourism Zone. Between people assuming new positions and the increase in the room-tax rate, the leaders of these organizations are reimagining the relationship that tourism has to the residents of Door County.

The signi cant increase in roomtax revenue essentially presented