Plano International Festival This year’s free main festival will be from 11 a.m.-5 p.m. at Haggard Park, though related events will begin at 10 a.m. and continue until 7 p.m.
Tracking tourism dollars
After a more than 30% decrease in overnight visitors to the city following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Plano saw its number of visitors surpass the 2019 total last year. Overnight visitors
2017 2.84M 2018 3.01M 2019 3.31M 2020 2.28M 2021 3.35M
+5.7%
+9.91%
-31.07%
+49.99%
SOURCE: CITY OF PLANO/COMMUNITY IMPACT NEWSPAPER
Direct Travel Spending tracks purchases made in Plano during visitors’ overnight and day trips to the city. These figures include hotel taxes as well as local and state taxes. Spending by visitors
PHOTOS COURTESY PLANO INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL
Wellness Fair and Fitzone The pop-up will be from 10 a.m.-1 p.m. at the Courtyard Theater. It will feature free flu shots, health screenings, fitness demos and more. with visitors of the various corporate headquarters in the city, Thompson said. Toyota Motor North America has its headquarters in Plano, and there are also regional headquarters for Liberty Mutual Insurance and more. “That fills up our hotels and gen- erates [occupancy tax] room nights, mainly Monday through Thursday,” Thompson said. When the weekend comes and cor- porate travelers head home, Thomp- son said local hotel rooms are often filled by visitors coming in for amateur sports tournaments, conventions and more leisure activities. “One of the things that really kept us going [during the beginning of the pan- demic] is the city’s foresight to have the sports facilities that we have,” Thomp- son said. “Traditionally, youth sports is kind of recession proof.” In addition to baseball and soccer fields as well as basketball and tennis courts, Thompson said Plano appeals to fans of the English-born sport cricket with more fields to play it than anyone
Dancing with the Symphony The show will be from 6-7 p.m. at the Saigling House on Avenue H. It will see the Plano Symphony help bring global dances to life. Tickets are required. else in the southwestern U.S. For those looking for less strenuous activities, options include shopping and nightlife areas such as Legacy West, the Downtown Plano Arts Dis- trict and The Shops at Legacy. Comedy club The Plano House of Comedy opened at The Shops at Legacy last year. It hosts a mix of local comics and touring headliners, such as Paul Mecurio. The actor and comedian, who also hosts the podcast “Inside Out with Paul Mecurio,” played the club on Aug. 18-20. He called the club a great room with an audience that had a respect for the art form of standup comedy. During his time in the city, Mecurio said he got the sense that Plano’s pop- ulation has grown rapidly as he met transplants from all over the U.S. “I would definitely come back and would recommend the club [to other comics],” he said.
2017 $713.22M 2018 $758.21M 2019 $828.94M 2020 $584.86M 2021 $750.01M
+6.31%
+9.33%
-29.44%
Direct Employment tracks the average number of full- and part-time positions associated with travel spending in Plano. Employment opportunities +28.24% SOURCE: TEXAS TRAVEL RESEARCH DASHBOARD/COMMUNITY IMPACT NEWSPAPER
2017 6,750 2018 6,920 2019 7,480 2020 5,820 2021 6,800
+2.52%
+8.09%
-22.19%
+16.94%
SOURCE: TEXAS TRAVEL RESEARCH DASHBOARD/COMMUNITY IMPACT NEWSPAPER
Additionally, the Children’s Global Village will offer educational activities, crafts, puppet shows and more. “Our goal is to make sure that the festival represents exactly in atten- dance the demographic that we have in North Texas,” Katzer said. “More than 100 cultures are represented.” Thompson said the international fes- tival and the balloon festival are fairly unique to Plano, so each event can help
draw in tourists to the city. “It’s hard to put a value on a visitor that comes in [for] one event because they come back several times,” he said. “Everybody starts as a visitor, and from there, they may end up coming to be a resident or a company owner.” Filling Plano hotels Beyond the annual festivals, Plano hotels are usually filled during the week
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PLANO SOUTH EDITION • SEPTEMBER 2022
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