OCEAN CITY — As part of the ongoing effort to really nail down what a particular special event brings to the town in terms of economic impact, resort officials this week got an overview of one of the newest tools in the toolbox.
Determining what a given special event brings to Ocean City in economic impact versus the cost of hosting the event in terms of costs and strain on services has been a top priority for the town in recent years. Ocean City already has in place a comprehensive return on investment (ROI) policy that breaks down the economic benefit of the various special events it hosts, but Business and Tourism Development Director Tom Perlozzo on Monday presented to the Mayor and Council a new Economic Impact Calculator created and serviced by a private sector company that will help his department take a little deeper dive into the economic importance of the various special events.
“We’re partnering with Destinations International with this,” he said. “It’s used by 300 destinations around the country. It will calculate economic impact of sports, special events, meetings and conventions. The models are designed to provide the economic value of the event and calculate its return on investment in local taxes, jobs and more. This tool will be a gage to retain and recruit special events, sports, meetings and festivals. It is fairly new in our hands.”
Perlozzo said the purpose of the program is to allow the Mayor and Council to see significant evaluations and recommendations and make informed decisions about recruiting or retaining special events.
“The real issue is what an event is worth to a destination,” he said. “We’ve had three weeks with it. There will be pre-event evaluations and post-event evaluations. We can do some research after to see if it’s accurate. We’re excited about it.”
Perlozzo said the Economic Impact Calculator provides a comprehensive, holistic look at the direct and indirect impacts of an event on a destination.
“It’s a top down, bottom-up approach,” he said. “How much does an event generate? How many jobs does it create? How much direct spending does it generate? It’s really two things, direct spending and indirect spending. Those two things are really important.”
The Economic Impact Calculator will analyze all of the town’s special events from sports to meetings, and from conventions to trade shows. The packet included preliminary breakdowns of existing town events such as the Maryland Municipal League Convention (MML) and the Maryland Association of Counties Convention (MaCO) to illustrate just how much those events bring to the resort in terms of direct and indirect spending, tax revenue and job creation. Perlozzo said he and his staff have been working with Destinations Marketing on how best to use the Economic Impact Calculator, but he is excited about the early efforts. He said the staff under his overall umbrella have been working with it already along with City Manager Terry McGean.
“It’s going to take a while to adapt,” he said. “Terry has gathered the troops to get everyone involved.”
Councilman Lloyd Martin said the town in recent years has implemented a return on investment (ROI) policy for special events, largely under the watchful eye of Special Events Director Frank Miller. He pointed out it has long been a goal at the committee level to pin down just what a certain special event means to the resort in terms of direct and indirect impact.
“It’s been a long time coming,” he said. “We’ve been working on this at the Recreation and Parks Committee for a long time. Frank does a great job, but this company is all over the world.”
Councilman John Gehrig, who chairs the recreation and parks committee, agreed the Economic Impact Calculator will help the town break down special events and make informed decisions about which ones to retain and which ones to recruit.
“This is definitely going to help with the costs and the projected revenues,” he said. “We can look at how much they spend, where they are spending it and how much they are enjoying everything Ocean City has to offer. This is really going to help us.”
Perlozzo said the Economic Impact Calculator will help his department really make informed decisions about what special events to go after for the resort.
“We’ve tasked ourselves with recruiting winners,” he said. “It’s going to be a great tool. It’s fairly significant. Take the C3 Presents festival, for example. It would show us how many people came here for the event and how many would have been here anyway.”
Councilman Frank Knight was impressed with the early impact summaries included in the packet for event such as MML, MaCo and Bike Week, for example.
“These impact summaries are fantastic,” he said. “Will this apply to all of the events you bring through?”
Perlozzo said the new tool will scrutinize all events large and small and result in recommendations for returning them.
“Yes, it will,” he said. “This will show us what the occupancy rate is, what the average daily rates are. This will give us all of that. We’re excited about it.”
