Lodging analyst touts marketing 'strike zone'.

• Author: Romig, Suzie
• Position: STATE of the STATE

What times of year do tourism-related businesses not bother spending their limited marketing dollars?

Researchers at Denver-based lodging metrics company DestiMetrics have homed in on a marketing "strike zone" to help mountain communities better budget for and manage the inevitable peaks and valleys of the tourism industry, says Ralf Garrison, principal at the resort intelligence firm. After more than a decade of aggregated data collection for up to 25 resorts in North America, Garrison puts that strike zone at 25 percent to 75 percent of lodging occupancy.

Marketing dollars are best reserved to spend between the "knees" and "shoulders" of overall resort occupancy, to avoid a diminishing return on investment, Garrison says. When lodging reservations--which can be predicted up to 90 days in advance --exceed about 75 percent occupancy, resorts can curtail marketing. Reservations may continue, but allocating budget dollars to encourage visitors is not economically efficient, he explains.

Marketing to the strike zone as an analogy was a home run with Vanessa Agee, director of marketing for the town of Frisco, who has 14 years of experience with events in Summit County.

"Somebody actually put a number on it and verbalized something that people are scared to talk about because a lot of people think more is better," Agee says. "It's really frightening to say'enough is enough' because we want to preserve the quality of life for both locals and visitors. You don't want either of those parties to live under the crush of tourism."

Although resort marketers are hesitant to say there are times their towns are crowded, and emphasize different tolerance levels for being overcrowded, many agree with the premise of the strike zone and work to balance their year-round ebbs and flows. Bruce Horii, director of marketing at Beaver Run Resort in Breckenridge, says he minimizes the valleys by promoting conventions at the 500-room...