Report: West Tennessee hot spot for tourism in 2019

JACKSON, Tenn. — 2019 was a huge hot spot for tourist in West Tennessee.

Tourist volume skyrocketed in 2019 in the area, according to the Economic Impact of Travel in Tennessee report.

The report indicates Madison County was sixth in the state as far as growth and was up over 5 percent.

Executive Director of Visit Jackson, Tennessee, Lori Nunnery says this is simply impressive for a community of our size.

“For us, we’ve always been really underfunded compared to our partners like Clarksville and comparable cities. The city and the county and have allowed us to be funded at a higher level, and so that’s helping us to be able to do more things to market it to let people know,” Nunnery said.

Nunnery says the biggest contributing factor of rising tourist numbers is due to the hotels.

“Out of that money that comes into the hotels, we get 20 percent of it. So 40 percent goes to the city’s general fund, 40 percent goes to the county’s general fund, and we get the 20 percent that’s left,” she said.

Nunnery says there is so many things to do in the Hub City that most people may not even know about.

“Even in a COVID environment, there are things that you can do. You know there are restaurants you can go to, there’s retail operations, unique retail operations, and there’s great sports and outdoor activities,” she said.

The numbers for 2020 are unknown at this point, but Nunnery says she does expect a decrease in travel volume due to COVID-19.

For 2021, she says once large travel groups get back up and running, we’ll begin to see an increase of tourism.

Nunnery hopes more people visit Jackson in the future and hopes they are aware of all the great things Jackson and Madison County has to offer.