Breckenridge Tourism takes stock of challenges ahead

Monday, June 21, 2021

At its annual meeting Thursday, June 17, the Breckenridge Tourism Office reflected on how its goals and structure changed throughout the past year while also announcing its latest One Breckenridge Service Champion Award winners.

Tourism office President Lucy Kay started by plugging the office’s 2020 annual report, which can be viewed atOneBreckenridge.com. The report details the events and activities of the tourism office leading up to and during the COVID-19 pandemic and how it impacted the office.

“We’re so proud of how our community came together and really worked shoulder to shoulder to find our way through these past 18 months, and we’ve made that annual report really more like a documentary and a tribute to that incredible collaboration in our community,” Kay said.

Kay also said that despite the pandemic, tourism office web visits went up 21 per cent, the number of users went up 15 per cent, and lodging referrals from JackRabbit — a tourism-focused software company — went up 26 per cent.
Richard Sosville, chairman of the board, went on to outline the office’s finances for the year, which looked drastically different due to the pandemic.

At the start of the pandemic, the tourism office refunded $477,000 to the town, along with an additional $300,000 at the end of 2020, which the town used for local assistance programs. This extra money came from the number of programs cancelled throughout the year because of the pandemic, Sosville said.

Sosville said the tourism office also refunded Breckenridge Ski Resort its typical $150,000 contribution since so much summer programming was cancelled last year.

Despite the difficulties the pandemic caused for the tourism office, Sosville said it managed funds efficiently and received a “perfectly clean audit” for the year.

The office reduced its budget request from the town of Breckenridge by about $400,000 for this year. Sosville said he also expects to absorb revenue shortfalls for the lack of events and sponsorships this year.

He added that the office always works closely with the town to make sure programs are in sync with town goals.

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