Area Positioned For Tourism Growth

By Christie Swanson

Saturday, June 26, 2010

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BENTONVILLE — Northwest Arkansas is in a position to create an arts and entertainment cluster, said Kathy Deck, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research at the Walton College.

“It’s important for us in Northwest Arkansas to know what our challenges and our opportunities are,” Deck said during Friday’s Quarterly Business Analysis at the Shewmaker Center.

The leisure and tourism sector is one area where opportunities lie, Deck said. The sector employed 9.4 percent, or 18,856, of the area’s 200,700-person work force as of May. There was a slight decline from last year, but Deck said there is growth potential in both revenue and jobs.

Construction continues at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, and Fayetteville’s Walton Arts Center is considering expansion.

Buddy D. Philpot, executive director of the Walton Family Foundation, sent a letter to the Walton Arts Center this week stating the foundation believes a Bentonville location would be best for adding to the performing arts venues in Northwest Arkansas.

The foundation gives about $1 million a year to the center and was the main benefactor in the 1992 construction of the Dickson Street facility.

The site selection process is scheduled to end Aug. 2.

The expansion has been discussed for a few years with much debate over where a new center would be.

“In 10 years when there is a Walton Arts Center North and a Walton Arts Center South, all this will be forgotten,” Ed Clifford, president of the Bentonville-Bella Vista Chamber of Commerce, said of the location debate.

Terri Trotter, the arts center’s chief operating officer, said the location will be what is best for the business.

“We perceive ourselves as being a regional player already,” Trotter said.

She said no matter where a new facility is located, the Fayetteville venue will remain active. During the past few years, Trotter said they have worked to be more regional with events such as the Artosphere Festival that stretched events from Fayetteville to Bentonville.

Crystal Bridges sits as a centerpiece to what this cluster could become, Deck said. The original opening date was spring 2009 but has been pushed back indefinitely.

Several hotels have been built in anticipation of the museum’s opening. A Trend Report by Smith Travel Research, a market research group, shows hotels in Benton and Washington counties have grown from 72 in January 2004 to 101 in May. Occupancy rate year-to-date through May was 42.8 percent.

Low occupancy rates and overbuilding are challenges to this kind of anticipatory growth, Deck said. New jobs will be added as new venues open, but the growth won’t be as big as it would have been if the hotels would have come online closer to the museum’s opening.

The area may be overbuilt in hotels, but that hasn’t stopped growth. There are plans for a $28 million 21c Museum Hotel to be built in downtown Bentonville.

“I think it’s a real opportunity to really leverage our tourism potential. We have not done that to this point,” Deck said.

Establishing an arts and entertainment cluster will benefit the area and the state, said Montine McNulty, executive director of the Arkansas Hospitality Association in Little Rock

“People don’t think of Arkansas as an art state,” McNulty said.

If tourists come to the state once, they are likely to return and bring other people with them.

“Leisure travel will be a very important asset for what is already a great area,” McNulty said.

Trotter said on average a cultural tourist will spend more money and stay longer than other visitors.

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