The martial arts world exposition that attracts more than 20,000 people to downtown Little Rock every year will instead draw crowds to Arizona in 2021, a Little Rock Convention and Visitors Bureau spokeswoman said in a news release Friday.
The ATA International World Expo will be in Phoenix starting in July 2021 after being held for more than 40 years in Little Rock, said Libby Doss Lloyd, communications manager for the Convention and Visitors Bureau. The competition was Little Rock's largest annual event.
ATA International, which boasts being the world's largest organization dedicated to teaching martial arts to any age, had a $5 million economic impact in central Arkansas this year during its July world championship competitions, Lloyd said.
Although the world competition will move to Arizona, ATA International CEO Neil Morton said the organization is working to move its Fall National Tournament from Orlando, Fla., to Little Rock.
Morton said the international competition has simply outgrown the Little Rock facilities. This year's event sprawled across every available area in the Little Rock Convention Center and Robinson Center, Lloyd said.
ATA International set up its headquarters in Little Rock in 1977 and held its first Grand National Tournament in Arkansas' capital in 1978. The organization now has nearly 300,000 members worldwide. The organization's headquarters will remain in Little Rock, as will multiple local, regional and national competitions and events, Lloyd said.
Little Rock Convention and Visitors Bureau President and CEO Gretchen Hall said in the news release Friday that she hopes to expand Little Rock's meeting and convention space and draw the World Expo back to Little Rock in the future.
Metro on 10/27/2019