Off Season: Utah tourism is working to draw visitors in slower months.

• Author: Haraldsen, Tom
• Position: Business Trends

Ask anyone whose job it is to promote travel and tourism in their region about their "dry seasons," and you might not get a response. After all, no one wants to admit there are times when their resort, retreat or destination location is perhaps a bit less desirable than other times. But the reality is that there are peaks and valleys with tourism in Utah, just as there are in every other corner of the travel world.

That being said, Utah's tourism industry continues to grow. Record-setting numbers of ski days in 2015-16, sparked in part by an improving economy and lower fuel prices, has pushed tourism into a nearly $8 billion industry annually.

Vicki Varela, managing director of the Utah Office of Tourism, Film and Global Branding, met with more than 400 tourism professionals from across the state in late September. Their purpose was developing a strategy to continue growing the state's piece of the industry pie.

"We have a tight-knit tourism community in Utah and we're all committed to sustainably growing Utah's tourism industry," she says. "Educational breakouts and peer discussions help local leaders create their own roadmaps to what tourism should look like in their community."

Tapping into potential

Still, there's potential for more. Ironically, almost all tourism venues enjoy the duplicity of Utah's environment--the winters with a dry, fluffy snowfall that creates our "Greatest Snow on Earth," and the hot but dry summers that allow for avid mountain climbing, hiking and biking. It's when those respective seasons fall between the cracks that local leaders grapple with how to keep the visitors coming.

"The off-season in St. George is usually the on season in Zion National Park," says Roxie Sherwin, director of the St. George Tourism Office. "With our weather in the springtime, it's sports like baseball, softball and soccer who come to St. George for their tournaments. As the weather continues to warm, outdoor recreation--particularly in Zion--is what we focus on. Everyone in the state is seeing tourism up substantially."

Sherwin says that December and January are the slower months. So her office works at bringing groups into town for conventions or tournaments. And even in the very hot summer months, the Dixie area proves attractive to national organizations. St. George will host the National Horseshoe Pitchers World Tournament next July, an event the city hosted in 2013.

"When we have quiet months, we go after events that fit that time...