‘STAY HOME’
Wisconsin tourism, decimated by coronavirus, asks people not to come to vacation destinations
Stressed over the spread of coronavirus, some folks are seeking comfort in Wisconsin Dells, the Northwoods, Door County and other vacation destinations.
“It seems like everybody thinks this is the hiding place and they want to come up here,” said Jack Moneypenny, president and CEO of the Door County Visitors Bureau.
But most things they’d enjoy, from taverns to water parks, are shut tight as COVID-19 decimates the tourism and travel business across the state and nation.
Door County issued a statement discouraging visitors from coming to the area for the next 30 days. This includes urging part-time residents to stay in their year-round homes. The county advised lodging entities to cancel reservations during that time frame and stop accepting new requests.
Some business owners are already fearing there won’t be a summer tourist season if the pandemic continues as long as experts project. While a handful of businesses reported no issues, others have begun laying off staff since precautionary measures went into place over the last week, according to Steve Jenkins, executive director of the Door County Economic Development Corp.
“We have a fabric that is tourism, manufacturing and agriculture,” he said. “None of those are going to escape major impacts that are going to be occurring over the next few weeks and months.”
However, as painful as it is, tourism businesses are generally supportive of the clampdowns meant to stop the spread of COVID-19.
“People think of us as a wide-open space because we’re not like a jammed city. But if we start getting the virus up here, it could be dangerous like anywhere else,” Moneypenny said.
One hospital serves Door County’s more than 27,000 residents. Plus, more than half the population is over 65 years old, a group at high-risk for adverse effects of the virus.
Tourism towns are also feeling the same pressures as other places, including the hoarding of essential goods as residents self-quarantine.
“Our grocery stores are very, very stressed right now. … I hate to say it, as a tourism organization, but our local residents and families have to come first, and the tourists come second,” Moneypenny said.
In Wisconsin Dells, home to one of the largest concentrations of water parks in the world, every major facility is shut down until at least April.
Kalahari, Great Wolf, Wilderness, Chula Vista, Mount Olympus, all closed. Some of the hotel operations remain open, but many aren’t, and hundreds of employees have been sent home.
Locals say they’ve never seen anything like it, not even when a dam on Lake Delton breached in 2008, sending millions of gallons of water into the Wisconsin River and leaving lakeside property high and dry that spring.
“That only affected businesses on the lake,” said Leah Hauk, who grew up in the Dells and is now spokeswoman for the Visitors and Convention Bureau.
The Dells has pulled its advertising from Illinois and other places it draws from heavily during the school spring break season.
“Telling people not to come here now definitely hurts,” Hauk said.
Nationwide, the travel industry is reeling from the coronavirus fallout.
“The impact is already more severe than anything we’ve seen before, including September 11th and the Great Recession of 2008 combined,” said Chip Rogers, president of the American Hotel & Lodging Association.
Based on current occupancy estimates, the association says about 4 million jobs have been eliminated or are on the verge of being lost in the next few weeks.
The losses for the travel industry alone could double the nation’s unemployment rate over the next two months and plunge the country into recession.
“This unprecedented public health crisis has quickly become a catastrophic economic crisis as well. Small businesses, which make up 83 percent of travel businesses, need relief right now if they’re going to be able to keep paying their employees,” said Roger Dow, president and CEO of the U.S. Travel Association.
In some cities, such as Seattle, San Francisco and Boston, hotel occupancy rates are already below 20% and individual hotels and major operators have closed.
The damage from coronavirus in Wisconsin’s hotel industry has been significant, said Trisha Pugal, president and CEO of the Wisconsin Hotel and Lodging Association.
“I was here for 25 years, then I retired and was called back. I haven’t seen anything like this before,” she said.
“It’s so fluid. Things are changing day to day,” she added.
The lodging business gets traffic from three sources — vacationers, business travelers and convention/eventgoers — and each group is pulling back on travel.
Small motels could be hit especially hard, as often they don’t have much in financial reserves, according to Pugal.
Laying off staff is problematic because those employees might have moved on to other jobs by the time tourism rebounds.
“That is the last painful thing (hotel operators) have to face because they know that good employees are important, especially in the hospitality industry,” Pugal said.
Jenkins echoed Pugal — in his 45 years in economic development, he has never faced a situation like this. Most people haven’t, leaving few answers to many lingering questions people in roles like his are grappling with, not to mention the concerns facing health care workers around the globe.
“We not only have a health emergency and crisis that has to be addressed immediately, but we’re also going to see an economic downturn that we’ve got to address as a nation and as communities,” Jenkins said.
In Sturgeon Bay, Geri Ballard operates The Black Walnut Guest House. She canceled reservations until at least April 9 because she believes limiting visitors is key to preventing the spread of COVID-19.
But like every business owner in the area, she isn’t certain of an April 9 reopening. She has several guests booked for Easter weekend and plans to evaluate a week before then on whether to cancel those reservations.
While Ballard feels fortunate the precautionary closures are happening in March and April, rather than June or July, she hopes the measures don’t last into the summer and early fall when the demand for rooms usually spikes.
“It will definitely affect our income,” she said. “There’s a hardship with not taking reservations this month to help pay the bills.”
In Forest County, you can still go for a hike in Chequamegon Nicolet National Forest, but don’t plan on spending the weekend.
“In my mind, it makes no sense at all for people to be traveling,” said Mark Ferris, owner of the Little Pine Motel in Hiles in Forest County.
The motel, which opened in 1961, has a dozen rooms, each of them with a kitchenette and a rustic Northwoods charm. It has outdoor fire pits, walking paths and Little Pine Lake at its backdoor.
Hiles is pretty laid-back compared with nearby Eagle River, which has much more tourism, but the overall area has been hit hard by the coronavirus restrictions.
“It has had an immediate, significant impact,” Ferris said. “There are businesses throughout the Northwoods that will have a very difficult time sustaining themselves.”
Tourism businesses are also worried about the broader economic fallout from coronavirus as businesses and jobs are lost in many sectors.
“If people are going to be in catch-up mode, one of the things they’ll do is cancel vacation plans. They’ll have to deal with the reality that they’ve taken a hit to their finances,” Ferris said.
Sauk County, home to Wisconsin Dells, ranked third in the state for tourism spending after raking in about $1.3 billion in 2018, trailing only Milwaukee and Dane counties. Door County landed in seventh place, with total tourist spending of more than $366 million, according to a Door County Visitors Bureau Economic Impact of Tourism study.
Door County relies on the summer tourist uptick for a bulk of its revenue, and many people depend on seasonal jobs during that time. The study shows both Sauk and Door counties employed thousands in tourism jobs in 2018.
New information about the pandemic crops up several times a day, so many Door County leaders could not even begin to think past tackling the next hour or day, let alone the summer tourist season. Door County Board Chairman Dave Lienau said in 30 days leadership will reevaluate what the future looks like for the area.
Businesses are scared, Jenkins said. “My advice is you need to keep a level head, tend to your daily business and try to make sure it stays afloat and survive this crisis.”
Tourism officials in Bayfield are also urging people to stay away right now, in hopes that it will stem the spread of the virus and not ruin the more important summer vacation season.
“We are still hoping for, and are expecting, a great summer and fall. But let’s just all relax, remain calm, and follow the advice of the health experts,” said David Eades, executive director of the Bayfield Chamber and Visitors Bureau.
“We are telling people to ride it out for a couple of weeks. There’s not a lot to do up here right now,” Eades said.