How much money did total eclipse crowd pump into Evansville-area economy?

EVANSVILLE — You could quibble about just how many people visited Evansville and surrounding areas for April's total solar eclipse — but whatever their number, they spent a pile of money here.

Completed in June after more than two months of work, a study commissioned by eclipse planner Explore Evansville and conducted by market research firm Rockport Analytics produced a big estimate: $6.6 million.

That's how much Explore Evansville said the total tourism spending "lift" amounted to in the study's area of focus: Vanderburgh, Warrick, Posey and Gibson counties in the April 5-9 weekend surrounding the eclipse. The once-in-a-lifetime celestial event happened in Evansville, which was in its 115-mile-wide "path of totality," just after 2 p.m. on April 8, a Monday.

$6.6 million is what Rockport Analytics called the "net spending," or the increase in total tourism spending over what would have been spent without the eclipse. The net is "derived by comparing the expected spending levels for the period of April 5 to April 9 with the observed spending levels over the same period," the firm's report states.

In other words, money spent by visitors who came specifically for the eclipse.

The biggest chunks of that extra money came in spending for food and beverages and lodging.

Eclipse tourists in the four counties spent $3.4 million over and above what otherwise would have been spent on food and beverages — $8.9 million instead of $5.5 million — and $1.6 million more on lodging. Percentage-wise, it was a bigger jump for lodging — an 82% increase — than for food and beverages, which was 63% higher.

There were significantly smaller increases in spending for recreation and entertainment, transportation and retail. The smallest increase, 6.5%, was in retail spending.

Bob Baer, a Southern Illinois University official who played a central role in the planning of Carbondale, Illinois for the 2017 eclipse, told the Courier & Press before the event that visitors to Evansville likely would not stay here for the entire weekend and would not spend extravagantly beyond food and beverages.

"Keep in mind the majority of people just come in for one day," Baer said. "They don't go to the grocery store and in most cases don't even shop for souvenirs outside of what they can grab conveniently at their viewing location. They get gas, a meal or two, and go home."

But the increase in spending for lodging showed many visitors did stay at least one night. Most of Indiana's tourism came from within the state, according to Rockport Analytics' report. But that's not the whole story.

Rockport includes a map of the United States showing the origin points of visitors who came to Indiana from 50 miles or more. But all told, nearly 500 cities in the U.S. were located on the eclipse's path of totality — Indianapolis among them. There was little reason for eclipse tourists north of Evansville to come here, although some surely did.

Explore Evansville's marketing to potential visitors was aimed at parts of Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama and Georgia that are in reasonable driving distance. And the new report's map does show significant numbers of visitors to Indiana from Kentucky and Tennessee and additional visitors from points farther south. Henderson, Kentucky also was in the 115-mile-wide "path of totality."

In Vanderburgh County, Rockport reported, about 3,400 of the county's nearly 3,900 hotel rooms were occupied on Sunday, April 7.

The methodology

To arrive at its estimates of the overall incremental "lifts" in visitation and spending driven to Southwest Indiana by the eclipse, Rockport used previous economic impact studies to derive baseline — expected — levels of both for April 5-9.

The firm also used:

• Geolocation and credit card spend data reported by Datafy;
• Lodging statistics from STR/Costar; and
• State and local taxes reported by taxing jurisdictions.

"Rockport leveraged an economic model of Indiana to estimate how traveler spending resounds through the state and regional economies," the firm's report states. "Rockport Analytics chose the IMPLAN model for Indiana (www.implan.com), a non-proprietary economic model that has become the standard for most economic impact assessments in the United States. This model is critical to measuring the direct, indirect and induced impacts of visitation to the state."

So just how many people did come here?

Local planners for the total solar eclipse had said the event might bring 80,000 visitors to the area. In the days afterward, Alexis Berggren, Explore Evansville's president and CEO, said it's likely 80,000 visitors from areas at least 30 miles away did visit Vanderburgh, Warrick, Posey and Gibson counties and Henderson County, Kentucky.

But not all in large public gatherings, Berggren said. In smaller gatherings spread over a large area.

Rockport Analytics tackled the question by projecting that 110,378 visitors would have come to the four Southwest Indiana counties during the eclipse period had there been no eclipse. But with the eclipse, a projected 150,382 visitors from at least 50 miles outside the regional border did come.

"So that would have been a 'lift' over what we would have typically had from a tourism standpoint by about 40,000," Berggren said.

It's the projected number of people who wouldn't have been in the area, who wouldn't have had tourism business or visitation business here, without the eclipse.

"When we were forecasting early about number of visitors, I wasn't actually forecasting 'lift,' per se," Berggren said. "I was forecasting just, number of visitation. I was saying the eclipse will draw 80,000 people to the community.

"It's really more of a tourism nuance. We weren't right, we weren't wrong."

Eclipse supported jobs and wages too

• Rockport broke the 40,000 extra visitors — 40,004, to be precise — into two groups: 14,777 "day-visitors" and 25,226 "overnight visitors."
• Eclipse tourism generated $4.6 million in "value added to the four-county region’s economy above baseline levels," according to Rockport's findings. The biggest chunk of that: The visitor activity "supported nearly 100 jobs throughout the region, paying $2.9 million in wages," the report projected. About half of that $2.9 million was generated in accommodation and food services. It's consistent with the report's earlier finding that the biggest chunks of the $6.6 million total tourism spending "lift" were derived from food and beverages and lodging.
• Federal, state and local taxes generated by visitors in the four counties during the eclipse period added up to $1.1 million, according to Rockport.

With Rockport's report finally in hand, Explore Evansville's Berggren declared the eclipse a success. The event was safe, she said. It was beautiful. And it was good for economic development.

"At the end of the day, we still saw 150,000 people through the region, which would have been 40,000 more than we could have expected under normal tourism conditions," she said.