The North Shore and Gunflint Trail communities are well-known vacation destinations for Minnesota leisure travelers. As the Stay-At-Home orders are lifted, local businesses prepare to welcome back visitors who are excited to get away.
“Tourism makes up over 80 percent of our local economy,” says Linda Jurek, Executive Director of Visit Cook County. “While April and May are some of our quietest months for visitation, they are still a critical part of the tourism equation. For every day we remain closed in May, the economic loss to our community is approximately $500,000 a day.” In total, the estimated losses for April countywide is over $7 million dollars.
While the Stay-At-Home order recommended Minnesotans to stay within an hour of their homes, it did consider lodging establishments as essential. However, most local lodging businesses chose to close ahead of the governor’s orders to allow local health care entities and their lodging properties time to develop new protocols and procedures for how to keep visitors, employees and residents safe.
To help local businesses prepare to reopen, Visit Cook County has created a Best Practices Guidebook with partnership from business owners and local health care professionals. The guide encompasses everything from lodging and dining to canoe outfitting and seasonal employee housing. “We were noticing a lot of larger hoteliers and metro based businesses creating something similar,” says Jurek. “However, in a rural area like ours, operations are so vastly different. We needed something that was more relevant to our area.”
With these new health and safety protocols in play, local businesses are preparing for an incremental opening in May. “For generations, our community has been a welcoming place for visitors. And while it may take time to resume business as usual, we look forward to seeing new faces and familiar faces return”
In addition to the Best Practices Guidebook, Visit Cook County has been creating strategic messaging to remind people about the importance of social distancing through the One Moose Apart campaign and encourages people to #dreamnorthmn. The #dreamnorthmn campaign is a collaboration between Visit Duluth, Glensheen and Iron Range Tourism which invites visitors to plan and dream about their favorite places in northeastern Minnesota. Campaign elements include custom temporary Facebook profile frames and collaborative videos.
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