Our View:Events bring money to all of Sweetwater County

We are excited to hear about the Newmar Kountry Klub International Rally, which will take place in August 2020.

We believe all of the hard work employees at the Sweetwater Events Complex have been doing is paying off.

We also agree we can’t advertise tourism in Sweetwater County enough because it can become an economic engine for the entire county.

According to a press release from the complex, the Newmar Kountry Klub International Rally will bring more than 1,000 visitors to the area and about $818,000 in economic impact. This is something we most certainly can support. With the oil, coal and gas industries suffering lately, we’ve wrote how we support different ways to diversify the economy and believe this will help.

Over the years, the events complex has tried to recruit various groups to the county and we are happy their efforts are paying off.

Most of the recruiting efforts started when the county landed the National High School Finals Rodeo. With the success of that event came other opportunities.

This summer, the event complex again hosted the NHSFR and it had the highest number of contestants, 1,590, the complex had checked-in since hosting the event. Contestants traveled from all over the United States, Canada, Mexico and Australia to compete. This year, they had 1,472 from the United States, 11 from Australia, 109 from Canada and 15 from Mexico. All of this draws attention to Rock Springs and Sweetwater County.

Not only does Sweetwater County get recognized, but about $8.5 million was brought to the county when the rodeo took place. This money isn’t all spent at the events complex, it’s spent by families staying in hotels, eating at local restaurants, fueling up at gas stations, renting tubes to float the Green River and buying fishing poles to fish Flaming Gorge and the Green River, events complex Executive Director Larry Lloyd said.

Just this past summer, the events complex hosted its first RV rally. An events complex press release stated the Tiffin Allegro Club Rally brought 352 motor coaches with 700 participants from 38 states and two Canadian providences to Rock Springs. The direct spending from the tourists brought more than $418,400 in sales to local restaurants, bars, shopping and gas stations.

We’ve noticed the tourism angle success and we want it to continue and become a more stable source of income for the county.

 

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