Destination marketing, accommodation taxes, and mandated tourism promotional expenditures: may be time to reconsider

Abstract

Convention and Visitors Bureaus (CVBs) play an important role in the destination marketing matrix. As a rule, most of the funds that support the marketing efforts of these organisations come from a pool of state legislated accommodation tax funds that have been collected from visitors to the destination. This paper questions the mandated use of these tax revenues for destination marketing, noting that for many communities such expenditures may fail to represent their best usage.