Conference Addresses Tourism

It may be difficult for Santa Feans to think a tourism problem might exist, since providing directions and restaurant suggestions to out-of-towners seems to be part of almost everyone’s life here.

But this week’s International Conference on Creative Tourism is dealing with some serious issues facing the tourism industry.

With the dollar so weak and foreign currency so strong, “we should be doing much better,” said New Mexico’s Tourism Secretary Mike Cerletti, speaking Wednesday during the five-day conference at the Santa Fe Community Convention Center.

Cerletti said the United States used to have 9 percent of the world’s market share for inbound tourism, but it’s now 6 percent. While that doesn’t sound like a huge decrease, Cerletti said, “each point is worth $12 to $15 billion.” The tourism

industry blames much of that decline on the United States’ entry procedures at airports. “Our entry process is viewed by the rest of the world as the worst entry process in the world,” he said. “We require photos and fingerprints.”

And he added that the United States is the only country in the world without a national office of tourism. “Last year, the U.S. spent zero to advertise this country,” Cerletti said.

With that dismal picture as the background, Cerletti then introduced luncheon speaker Geoffrey Godbey, professor emeritus at Pennsylvania State University and president of Next Consulting, a company dedicated to repositioning leisure and tourism services for the future.

While Godbey was hopeful about the prospects for “creative” tourism — engaging travelers in a community’s culture through active participation — he said there are poor prospects for tourism in general. A poor travel environment, he said, stems from factors such as high government and consumer debt, higher fuel prices, “terrible airline service,” increased gridlock (“the population is growing like crazy, and the middle class is growing like crazy”), complex household time schedules, an environment in “fundamental crisis,” lowintensity wars of attrition, and the transportability of chaos (“bombs, bird flu, a multitude of pathogens”).

“In spite of this, the stunning growth of the middle class in China, India and elsewhere means demands for tourism will leap,” said Godbey.

Godbey believes that pleasure travel will then become more deliberate, more customized and more contingent. “In other words ... we think we’ll go if all the conditions are right,” he said.

But creative tourism may grow, Godbey said, because of the rise of the creative class. “Today, 12 percent of all U.S. jobs contain a huge range of occupations ... with arts, design and media,” he said. And those people, he said, have this point of view: “I don’t have to eat in a stinkin’ Olive Garden ... been there, done that.”

“For them,” Godbey said, “it (tourism) will move from entertainment ... to the search for creative participation in various parts of life, from food to art, of authentic host communities.”

Godbey said creative tourists want learning on their own terms. They want to be finished by dinnertime, to be liked by their hosts, to like their hosts, to avoid total immersion and to get high quality but no showoff luxury.

Creative tourists are “smarter, more critical, environmentally aware and demanding, and more easily feel at home,” said Godbey. “But they still want to shop, eat and drink because all tourists want to shop, eat and drink.”

He described the creative class as looking for experiences. “The one thing you can’t take from people is experiences,” he said.

Godbey also said research shows that creative tourism is going to involve an increasing majority of women. The figure estimated is 60/40 percent women/men, but he thinks it will be much higher.

He urged Santa Fe and other creative cities to “keep (retail) chains out if you want creative tourists” and to maintain the “scale” of their towns. “Creative tourism is a way that can help us avoid killing what we love,” said Godbey.

Many of those attending the conference were trying to figure out how to apply the advice to their particular situations. David Johnson, deputy director of the Arts Council in Tucson, wanted to find ways to connect the artist to the traveler. “To help the traveler have a more intimate experience,” he said.

Johnson said the Tucson Arts Council contracted with Santa Fean historian and conference speaker Jack Loeffler to identify cultural attractions between Tucson and Ajo, an old mining town.

“He went into communities to seek out creative types and cultural interests,” said Johnson. “Together we published a book (with a CD) called ‘Cultural Corridor,’ and the Arts Council distributes it to visitors and residents.”