Alpena Prepares To Receive Incoming Tourists To The Area
The Alpena Convention and Visitors Bureau is a marketing and management organization who’s primary mission is to enhance Alpena’s economy through promotion of Alpena’s historical and natural resources and beautiful atmosphere.
Mary Beth Stutzman is the President and CEO of the Alpena Conventions and Visitors Bureau she details how the C.V.B. is preparing for the upcoming Brown Trout Festival, “So, were always preparing for lots of people to come because we actively promote and cultivate to get lots of people here. So, when you’re preparing for big events, big weekends in the summertime we are constantly making sure that our supplies are up to date and that our website is working.” She adds “We’re actually revamping and refreshing our website to be a lot more interactive and people can build itineraries for themselves and send them to their friends and prepare for their trip better that way.”
However, with the Alpena Regional Airport Runway Project still ongoing, many of the incoming tourists might have to look at other traveling alternatives in order to attend the 49th Annual Michigan Brown Trout Festival. Mary Beth highlights the different transportation alternatives for tourists, “So we have multiple methods of transportation and ways that people can come to Alpena. We have our Eastern entrance which is the boat harbor, so people can visit us via water. They can [also] drive, we have people that bike camp here, they just go around the whole state and stay in Alpena for a while.”
According to the C.V.B’s data provided by Arrivalist, people travel to Alpena from other parts of Michigan, Ohio, Florida, Indiana, and Illinois just to name a few. According to the same data, tourists tend to visit the Alpena downtown area and the Alpena Wildlife Sanctuary among other locations as well. The downtown area compared to last year has seen visitation rates go up by 8% over last years number at this time and the Alpena Wildlife Sanctuary is also up by 6.9% compared to last year.
